I Don't Know Why The Caged Bird Sings
by yllimilly
Summary: Puppyshipping. It started with a homework assignment neither of them wanted to do. Then a series of less than pleasant visits to the Kaiba mansion. Joey doesn't quite understand what's wrong with Seto nor what he has to do with it, and he finds it frankly frustrating that, against all odds, he finds himself caring. Maybe.
1. Day One

A year ago, if you told Joseph Wheeler that he'd be standing here dumbly, raising his head so he could give the KC Corp security cameras a better look at his face, he'd have laughed. Then called you an idiot. Maybe punched you in the gut, if you so happened to be named Seto Kaiba.

But there he was. And there wasn't anything spectacular about it.

A whole summer spent moving boxes full time in a meatpacking plant did much to lessen Joey's taste for his fist powered, teenager tantrums. When his baby sister made him promise not to quit school for her, he had no choice but to give up on processed meats and sign up for a part time janitor job instead. In a hospital. The hours were all kinds of crazy, but at least the pay was the the best a high school senior could afford, and working conditions were rather good thanks to the union. Benefits.

The creaking hinges of the massive metallic gates drew Joey from his reverie. A security employee of imposing stature beckoned him inside. Joey jogged a bit to catch up with the man's long strides. Once he matched the man's pace, Joey let his eyes wander on the KC land only a few mortals had been given the privilege to see with their own eyes.

The Kaiba estate wasn't the pastoral type. Merely a vast, empty expanse of minutely cropped green grass. A sparsely lit alley split it in two symmetrical halves. At the epicenter lay, as if enthroned on the barren land, the lone Kaiba mansion.

Joey was made to wait in a lobby the size of his stepfather's crowded bungalow. Except that this room didn't feel small, with cathedral ceilings, exquisite furniture. In front of him hung a painting taller than himself. The house family portrait depicted a sober trio. The austere figure behind the KC empire, Kaiba's deceased father, a modern day Stalin look alike, was posing with his two adoptive sons. Joey's eyes were glued to the painting, intent on deciphering the look on Seto's younger face, when a mature female voice beckoned him.

"You are to be escorted to Kaiba's quarters."

The woman was about his height. She looked older than he was but too young to be his mother and was dressed in the traditional black and white maid outfit, frills and crisp collar and all. Joey resisted the urge to roll his eyes, taking a deep breath instead to calm himself down. Even retrieving his dad's alimony required was a less bureaucratic process than paying Seto Kaiba a visit. Well, he wasn't exactly visiting. This was the only time slot and place Kaiba could afford meeting up with Joey to work on a school assignment. Yes, just that. The prodigy billionaire CEO was having a friend over to work on a school assignment. Except that what binded them wasn't friendship. Quite the opposite, in fact.

The woman Joey temporarily dubbed 'the Maid' led him through carpeted hallways decorated before the two World Wars.

Cast iron chandeliers actually lit aflame (real flames, not light bulbs). Epoch photographs in reverse chronological order. Black and white rows of men standing in front of a factory. Tired faces. A bonnet clad, young but stern woman sitting in front of a mustached industrial. The couple was cropped in a claustrophobic, oval frame. Sepia. Joey couldn't quite imagine Seto Kaiba living in an environment like this. Kaiba wore several hats, but he didn't quite look like the aristocrat he was made out to be in this decor.

Well Joey, for one, certainly didn't blend in, with his scruffy hair and shoes, his ragged jeans, his distinctive, unrefined strut. He had lost track of where they were, how many corners they'd turned, how many closed doors they'd walked by in silence.

They passed through a thick, ebony door that creaked. The maid's heels clicked on the marble floor of the new room before them.

It was an impressive, octagon shaped room, with slightly taller walls and two huge windows that gave into the blackness of the night outside. Joey couldn't see whether there were trees beyond them, or whether they gave to vast, hilly green terrain. The maid walked to the other side of the room but Joey remained, taking in the livelier part of Kaiba's mansion. Potted trees. Probably rare ones, too. Davenports and antique little pieces of furniture he couldn't find a use for.

There were paintings, too, Renaissance-like, that he vaguely remembered having seen in history books. Too bad he knew nothing about any of them. The maid produced a keyring from her frilly apron and unlocked the door, naturally expecting Joey to come along. Before walking into the aisle with her, he looked back one last time at the unusual room they were about to leave behind. to see a striking painting hanging above the door whence they came. Joey recognized it to be the binding of Isaac. His mother would be congratulating herself if she knew that she hadn't sent her son to Sunday school throughout childhood for nothing.

The painting gave a lasting impression on Joey. Vivid at first, then somber. Abraham's fingers were sprawled over Isaac's face, holding his son's head in place. A knife was held in the father's other hand. Isaac's body was weak and naked; his limbs, contorted. Joey felt a chill run up his spine. He closed the door behind him and jogged to catch up with the maid. Didn't anyone take time to stop and smell the roses in this house?

The next wing didn't have the 'museum' feel that the rest of the mansion had. It was all brushed steel, glass, geometrical shapes and jagged lines. If this house had a soul, it would be diagnosed with multiple personality disorder.

They arrived to a halt before an open door. Beyond it, a room dark save for the faint glow of a computer screen. It cast grave shadows on the impassible features of its occupant.

"Mister Kaiba."

Joey turned to the Maid. From her tone, he couldn't tell whether she was introducing her employer to Joey, or if she was warning Kaiba of the intruder's presence. She bowed to Joey and promptly walked away, leaving him to his own devices. So without further ado Joey stepped into the living room. Office. Bedroom? He wasn't sure which.

Kaiba didn't acknowledge his presence. Or flinch, either, when Joey walked past him without a word, then unceremoniously plopped down in one of the luscious couches (these must cost at least two months' rent, Joey exclaimed internally).

Joey breathed out and closed his eyes. Man, that couch was something else. More comfortable than his own bed, even - not that his mattress set a standard for anything besides resilience. Joey's body wanted to doze off but Joey knew he was cursed with consciousness for the next ten hours at least, because of the energy drinks he'd gulped down in the taxi ride to the mansion. He couldn't risk falling asleep anyway; too many short nights in a row. There would be no coming back if he allowed himself to close his eyes now. He just had to keep going.

"You're early." Kaiba's voice rose as if from the depths of a cavern. Reproachful.

Joey sat up and turned to Kaiba, who kept typing away at his laptop. Perhaps because he was in his natural habitat, the teenage CEO first class student extraordinaire wore his shoulders slightly hunched forward, neck craned towards the blinking screen in the most inelegant fashion.

"At least I'm not late." Defensive.

The tone was set. So be it. Joey regretted getting himself in what clearly would end in a mess. Maybe a few bruises. But that wouldn't be so bad. There was always some enjoyment to be had in a good fight - and somehow Kaiba always delivered in that regard, without the hassle and intricate aftermath of getting tangled with gang members. Joey was rusty, but he'd sure welcome the adrenaline rush.

"I'm not ready yet. You will have to wait," Kaiba replied, his voice not exactly cold but distant, as if deeply focused on something.

Don't talk back. Be the better man. Gotta be the better man.

Being ordered around had never been Joey's forte, but right now that was not what Kaiba was doing. The apparent lack of snark or disdain, the neutral tone in which Kaiba spoke was almost... frustrating for some reason.

Perhaps because it gave Joey no legitimate reason to be angry at him.

Perhaps it was because Kaiba was plain ignoring him.

Okay, so moneybags had learned some manners.

Or was it a new manipulation tactic?

I'm thinking too hard about this.

At any rate, Joey still didn't enjoy being in Kaiba's presence. The flat screen TV on the wall was calling to him. It was about ten; one of the shows Joey used to watch, before he got the part time job, was on right now. Joey considered leaning forward to grab the remote, then thought better of it. Heck, he didn't have to watch that show. He could watch nothing. Or he could watch any show on the friggin' planet. No doubt in his mind that Kaiba had premium membership to every channel in the world. Well, maybe not. He wasn't the type to throw money away. Something he respected him for. Perhaps the only thing. It was funny. Joey tried to imagine Seto sitting down to watch TV, and couldn't. Kaiba plus fun just didn't add up together. Maybe that expensive toy was for Mokuba.

Joey eventually convinced himself he didn't really want to watch TV after all. Instead he focused on the certainty that no matter what he attempted to do, as long as he was in Kaiba's vicinity, he would wind up being shot down with a nasty remark. It sucked to be held up by Kaiba like this, but things could be worse.

Joey's eyes watered a little. He was tired and... Not quite sure he could hold on until morning for the work shift to come at the hospital. His body starting misbehaving because hey, why not. His knee was the first insubordinate limb.

Jumping.

Bouncing up and down.

When it wasn't sufficient a release, Joey began biting his nails - absentmindedly, mind you. He might have gone a bit too strong on the energy drinks, but he needed them. He had a night shift to cover after this homework session - the very reason why he'd arrived here early in the first place. At midnight sharp - a little less than two hours from now - Joey was to be in his overalls, scrubbing hospital floors.

But telling Kaiba about the nature of his upcoming date - a mop with green tape plastered around the handle - was out of the question. No way he'd give himself on a silver platter. Joseph Wheeler, the working class boy, washing sick people's excrement for a living! Too good a reason to laugh for Kaiba. The mocking wouldn't stop, and maybe the mutt jokes would come back, too.

Suddenly the couch wasn't so cozy anymore. Joey sprang up.

"Look, can we just get working? I can't stay here all night."

No reaction.

He walked up to Kaiba, standing next to him expectantly.

"Come on man, stop being a dick." He slammed his hand on the desk, hoping to distract Kaiba. Maybe for dramatic effect, too? "Other people have lives, too, in case you didn't know. I already came all the way here" for you, and I had to switch shifts, too, trading my usual for something shittier that'll fuck up my sleep schedule. So let's get going.

"I'd be done quicker if you let me be," Kaiba said, his voice surprisingly not monotone, even akin to that of a parent simplifying a grownup concept for a small child. Kaiba stopped moving for a second, fingers hovering above the keyboard, diligently waiting to be put to use again.

Joey noticed something was wrong with Kaiba's fingers.

"You're shaking."

Oops. That almost sounded like concern.

"I know," Kaiba bit back, still facing away.

"Uh, so, how come you're shaking?" Seto Kaiba's weakness - made known to mankind - and Joey was the first to witness it. Too good to be true!

"Tell me again why you are here?"

Kaiba laid his hands down on his desk as if to stress his annoyance, but Joey knew very well what the gesture was for.

To halt the shaking.

No- to try to and conceal it.

The index on his right hand kept twitching. Wow. Kaiba, a cripple? The tables were turned. This was going to be fun, regardless of the outcome. Joey felt a rush of everything at the back of his skull, kind of like that time when he realized he'd picked up a fight with five guys instead of three and his gambling gene was yelling inside every one of his cells: YES!

"No, but seriously, answer me. What's going on?" Joey wasn't sure whether he actually wanted to know or whether he wanted to annoy the fuck out of Kaiba. It certainly was not out of concern.

Kaiba stared intently at the screen in front of him. His jaw tensed. "Side effects," he hissed.

Joey's curiosity was piqued - it wasn't like Kaiba to open up like that. "Like what-"

"I've answered your question. Go yapping somewhere else," Kaiba snapped.

Joey considered him for a moment. "Okay. Okay. So that's how it is, huh." Bitching and cussing. Of course it was going to end up like this. Old habits die hard. Joey wasn't sure what to do, whether to cut the tense silence with another insult or to just give in the urge to hit that poster boy billion dollar face of his.

"Okay, just - fuck you, Kaiba."

Kaiba turned abruptly to look up at Joey with cold eyes - not his default cold. His subarctic cold.

Both men stayed still for a moment. Then, when Joey was certain this moment would remain imprinted in his memory, he walked away.

Calmly.

Slowly.

He was leaving his opponent's turf, victorious.

Or was he?

Telling Kaiba off should have felt more liberating. When Joey thought of the countless hours he'd spent brewing hatred for the man, replaying their botched fists fights in his mind and changing them, sometimes inventing new ones altogether, the long moments thinking of vicious comebacks that always seemed to slip away the moment he was in his presence, and the amount of actual f-words he'd told Kaiba to no avail...

No, that particular 'fuck you' just didn't measure up.

Joey stopped right by the door, in the hallway, realizing he had no clue which way to go. He really wished he'd been paying attention to directions when the maid escorted him, rather than wondering why someone would want to live in such a glum place - wasn't Kaiba master and commander of this? Couldn't he tear down those old pictures and paintings if he wanted to? Even Joey's own filthy apartment felt less... harmful than this.

Why on earth did he care whether Kaiba lived in a depressing hell hole?

He heard the squeak of a swivel chair behind him. Kaiba had moved. Joey turned to see. He shouldn't have. But his brain felt all jittery - if he stayed he was sure to lose it and say things he'd really regret. Not things that were meant to attack; things that were meant to hurt.

Joey saw Kaiba standing, tense as if holding back from something, yet perfectly still, his silhouette dark lissome in the weak light. He couldn't make out the look on his face.

"All I'm asking," said Kaiba in a ragged voice, pausing slightly between every word, "is for you to wait."

Kaiba sounded... tired. Joey raised his eyebrows slightly, unsure whether Kaiba noticed, unsure why he cared whether he did.

Kaiba waited. He didn't even appear to be breathing. Joey looked left and right. Shifted on his weight. Put his hands in his pockets.

Kaiba was preaching by example. He was waiting. For him. For Joey Wheeler. It was his move. Joey really didn't have a good reason not to act upon what, in Kaiba's mouth, sounded like an earnest apology. What in the name of the Lord is going on?

Whatever. "Okay. Yeah, sure. I'll wait."

What am I doing?

Joey walked back to where he'd been sitting before the argument, making it a point not to look in Kaiba's direction as he did. He could swear he felt Kaiba's gaze on him. Couldn't tell why - he just knew Kaiba was looking at him, studying him at this very moment. The mere thought made him feel uneasy.

The typing resumed only once Joey was settled on the couch again. The intermittent clicking of the laptop keys meshed with the blood pumping in his ears. His liver was fighting to pump the energy drink out of his system. He wondered if that's how his father felt whenever he went to sleep. The heart, drumming relentlessly, as if to scream 'hey! you're alive!'

Stop.

Don't think about it. Better not think about it.

Don't think about anything. Just stay here and do the assignment thing. Get it over with, be proud, know you've done the right thing. Wait for Kaiba to be done with whatever. Wait until he's done toying with your nerves. Just accept that you can't win, not this time.

He remembered how Serenity once told him 'you can't always win all the time'. He could hear her voice, see the way she shook her head in resignation in his mind's eye.

Joey winced.

* * *

><p>The room was bright.<p>

Joey craned his neck to see where the light was from. It was everywhere, bouncing off the walls to the ceilings and off the shiny metal furniture.

His neck hurt from having spent a glorious whole night's sleep on Kaiba's couch. Fully clothed.

Oh shit. Shit. Shit.

Joey's heart was beating like crazy, busy pumping the taurine and mixed feelings out of his system. Sweaty bangs were sticking to the base of his nape. He felt crass dirty. Shower. No. Get out of here first.

Someone had had the decency of draping a body bag over him. It took Joey a solid second to realize it was actually a silk blanket. Something out of a socialite soap opera, or porn movie, black and light and shiny. Oh man. What the heck is going on...

He stood up and stretched, cracking his joints and spine.

Kaiba's office looked different different in broad daylight. Clean, spacious, orderly, functional. Tall windows gave to more greenery Joey had ever seen in his entire urban life. Not only the office was bigger than what it looked like, it was L-shaped with a whole section that had remained hidden from sight. Then there were doors. Many, prohibitively inviting, metal doors. But Joey didn't have time to explore.

The chair at Kaiba's desk was empty, confirming that the child genius turned emotionally repressed CEO was not, in fact, a cyborg. Unless he was charging somewhere else.

Joey was not late for work. He was fucking late for work. Many hours too late. No, worse, he'd probably missed the night shift altogether. Shit.

Shit.

Joey walked around to see if there was some kind of clock or anything.

Then he heard 'it'.

The breathing.

Urgent goosebumps washed over Joey. He wasn't alone.

He tiptoed towards the sound, half expecting for something to explode. The sound came from the hidden section of the room, the longer end of the L.

In retrospect, he shouldn't have been shocked by what he saw. Nothing out of the ordinary, nothing to be alarmed about. Just someone sleeping. In a bed. A human being, lying in bed, his chest heaving up and down.

Kaiba had a bed in his office. A bed. In his office. He was sleeping in it. Joey strained his nutrient deprived brain to stitch everything together.

Seto Kaiba literally sleeps in his office.

Only then Joey noticed a granite countertop, a fridge and some other (kitchen?) appliances he couldn't identify. So he lived in the goddamn thing, too. Everything suddenly felt uncomfortable. And awkward. Overwhelmingly so. Joey couldn't stop looking, couldn't stop telling himself how intimate this situation was. He was no expert on the pop psychology behind people's sleeping positions, but Kaiba's didn't look natural - his neck and arms sprawled in unnatural angles, stretching too far like the stems of a sunlight deprived plant. Kaiba might qualify for vitamin D supplements, if the pallid shade of his bare torso was any indication. The lower half of his body was concealed in a black satin sheet that looked identical to the one that had been lent to Joey.

Jesus. What had Kaiba been thinking? Why hadn't he woken him up? Of course he couldn't know that Joey had to be somewhere at midnight because he hadn't told Kaiba because he'd thought Kaiba couldn't understand. So now they were both stuck in this impossibly awkward situation. Unless of course Kaiba didn't deem this awkward. This in turn added an extra layer of unease to Joey's queasiness, which was bordering on physical ill.

Black and red dots peppered Joey's vision for second. When the dizziness passed, Joey stormed out of the room. Took a left. At random.

He replayed in his mind the regular heaving of Kaiba's bony chest. His too readily exposed, sickly white skin.

Joey felt a cool chill wash over him.

He needed out.


	2. Day Two

Fortunately, Joey made it to the hospital a few minutes before his shift was scheduled to end.

_'You better thank Gianni. He covered up for you.'_

His supervisor's warning rang loudly in Joey's ears as he left the hospital's premises. He knew he might not be so lucky next time. Stefano Delledonne was an old friend of Joey's father and he felt a duty to take care of Bruce Wheeler's son - in his stead, almost. But he only had so much power in the face of the hospital's bureaucratic monster. Joey had gotten two red flags lately (i.e. within the four last weeks). He'd been caught snacking while on the job and there were rules forbidding the consumption of foodstuffs while handling chemicals - to hell with it! Starving was a much greater health hazard.

So in a way it made sense to say that Kaiba almost got him fired, but Joey couldn't really blame him for it.

Some of his spare change must've fallen from his pockets and into the cracks of Kaiba's couch because there wasn't enough to take the bus to school. Consequently, Joey had to run the entire way. By the time he got to school, he was the very definition of sweaty. He got to his first period a few minutes before it was scheduled to end, so he wandered around in the hallways until the next period would start. And that period was pain-in-the-ass English. English _Literature_, to be precise. Joey still couldn't figure out how in the world he hadn't failed that placement test. To him, this class felt more like the teacher was trying really hard to paint his essays red with pen ink.

Oh, and also, English was the class for which he had to work with Kaiba on the stupid assignment.

_In teams, compare and contrast your understanding of the book that you were assigned. Write your conclusions in a five page paper._

Joey's stomach gurgled. He'd have to count on Anzu and Tristan's generosity later at lunch. He'd go hypoglycemic and punch a thing in the face before he'd get to his beloved, albeit mostly empty, fridge at home tonight. Sadly, since his father's mini-stroke, this had become the norm rather than the exception. And then his dad probably wouldn't have gone grocery shopping so Joey would have to take care of that, too, but going to the closest strip mall by foot wasn't an option and change for a bus ticket wasn't going to magically appear for him at school so he'd have to walk home beforehand and he'd end up eating at like seven at the earliest... ah, jeez. Fuck life.

Joey went to the men's bathroom, beelined for the sink area, and without looking in the mirror, splashed his face with water. He scrubbed his teeth and gums with his calloused fingers to get some of the grime off. Then, he filled up on water until his stomach felt bloated. That old trick usually helped put off the hunger a little. Hurray for free tap water.

The bell rang. Students filled the bathroom. Joey suddenly became self-conscious, but immediately told himself that they could fuck themselves if they had a problem with him skipping on classes. He headed out straight to his classroom, no books or stationery whatsoever in hand - and no shame either. The teacher, dismayed, offered to lend him a pencil and a stack of sheets. When Joey walked away, she beckoned him to come back. Closer. She began in a strategically low voice:

"If there's anything you need...", then she paused, weighing her words, "don't hesitate."

"I'm fine," Joey replied flatly before spinning on his heel. He didn't need any help.

"Joseph?" She called out, a little louder and more firmly this time. "Could you please come see me after class?" The concern in her voice was evident.

Joey repressed a massive eye roll and kept a straight face not to hurt her feelings. No matter how he disliked being treated like a charity case, he knew goodwill when he saw it. "Yeah, sure." He walked away to the furthest row in the back and sat in his usual spot, where he knew he could doze off relatively unnoticed.

Except that today he was impossibly awake. Managed to jot down some notes he guessed might be of importance. There were some things about literary analysis, drawing on examples from the different works the teacher had assigned to the different teams in the class. Too bad Joey hadn't opened the book yet. He didn't even own it. He lost interest in the lecture as rapidly as he'd gained it. Everywhere around him, people looked sincerely busy with note taking or reading. Joey wished he'd sat by one of the windows. At least then he could have stared outside. He could've doodled, but felt he should make good use - academic use - of the sheets the teacher had given to him. _Least I can do_. He set out to pay attention again to catch up with the theory being dished out. The valiant cognitive effort lasted a good four fateful seconds after which Joey's brain followed the irresistible urge to wonder about Kaiba's whereabouts.

Kaiba's sunken silhouette captures his entire attention. He was located four desks away from Joey, in one of the central rows. They hadn't talked since this morning, not even made some kind of eye contact… Oops.

How did Kaiba react when he'd realized that Joey had vanished from his couch - from his bedroom? Did he react, or notice at all? Either way he was surely too busy to care. Maybe he'd forgotten about Joey's presence in his bedroom altogether before setting off to his own bed. _Get real, Joey, you don't matter to that jerk, not even as a nuisance_.

Still, Joey found himself wishing Kaiba would just look at him, or even vaguely in his direction, so that he could give him the cold shoulder. But Kaiba, studious as ever, was paying attention, taking notes with those elegant... limbs of his or whatever.

The bell rang in time to prevent Joey from venturing further into treacherous mental territory. The classroom drained itself of its pupils until just a few of them were left, chiefly among them the two reluctant teammates. Kaiba remained seated at his desk, unnaturally still. So was Joey, not really knowing what or who he was waiting for.

Two random students were lining up to speak with the teacher. Joey frowned and tsked. He was itching to get out of the classroom and out of the building, but there was no use leaving his seat yet. Joey's stomach started growling again as if to remind him to visit the water fountain. He glanced at his notes, but couldn't make sense of what was written. He couldn't even reread his own handwriting at places. Useless. This class, like all the others before, had pretty much been a waste of his time.

In his corner of the classroom, Kaiba was gathering and sorting his belongings, methodical as always. His hands didn't seem to be shaking. Maybe he was just hiding it well, or maybe they were shaking and Joey just wasn't close enough to notice. He'd been pretty unusually close, no, like, erm, _geographically_ close, to Kaiba yesterday evening. Normally, when they got this close to one another, it was to exchange blows, and fingers don't tend to shake when fisted.

Then, for no apparent reason, Kaiba stood up, suitcase in hand as if it had always been there, and walked towards the teacher's desk. Joey watched the teacher halt her conversation and asked her students to stand back for a minute. She stood up – undoubtedly to accommodate Kaiba's greater height. Joey remembered she had stayed seated the whole time she was talking to _him_, earlier before class. People seemed to do special things for Kaiba on accounts that he was rich. Who even goes to school with a friggin' suitcase?

Joey was being talked about. No doubt about it, judging from the furtive looks the teacher was throwing in his direction. Kaiba remained still until he bowed ever so slightly (more like a deep nod) to the teacher, then spun on his heel and stalked to Joey's desk.

Something weird happened then.

It seemed as if though Joey's heart beat faster with every step Kaiba was taking toward him. Was his body wired to expect danger whenever Kaiba came near?

"Thursday, ten thirty," Kaiba said impassively. "Not one minute before."

Joey raised an eyebrow. "One-" He shook his head in disbelief, regarding Kaiba for a moment, eager maybe to see if his anger was about to flare up, too. Joey took one deep breath. "Actually - let's just call it off. Like..." He took another deep breath and added, "you're busy, and like, _I'm_ busy," he closed his fist and pointed to his own chest – _I may not be a company CEO but I'm carrying the world on my shoulders, too_ - "and like, we're both busy and like…" He put his hands in his pockets, defensively, and looked away.

Then, in a lower voice, as if to hide from the teacher: "Besides, and you know it's just not gonna work, anyway." He glacned at Kaiba, his eyes narrow with resentment.

Kaiba's _own_ eyes, however, did not uphold Joey's gaze. They flickered away - a rare occurrence. A trio of unhurried girls walked past, ignoring them completely. Time held still for Joey and Kaiba. As if they were somehow special.

Kaiba pretended he needed to know exactly how many seconds had passed since the bell rang. "Well, it's up to you," he said in a surprisingly neutral tone.

Kaiba did not look at Joey in the eye again. He turned on his heel before he let Joey have a chance to speak.

He was already out the door when Joey returned to his senses. It was just Joey and the teacher, now. The classroom was empty. _Goddamn, stupid, friggin' mind games... Goddamnit! _

She proactively went for Joey's desk, sitting on a nearby chair. She smiled warily before starting what would surely be a full length interview on his father's health and his financial situation. Joey had heard it all and was honestly tired of it. They were managing just fine without other people messing around in their business. Well, he'd leared at least one good thing from all those well intentionned 'interventions': if he did a good enough job at looking like he was on top of things, people were actually more than happy not to meddle and add somebody else's troubles to their own pile of troubles.

Joey inhaled dramatically and straightened his shoulders. "Thank you for letting me use your pen, by the way." It was a freebie from a medical clinic.

"Oh, it's nothing. You can keep it, actually." Joey nodded in acknowledgement as he unceremoniously pocketed the thing. "Joey," the teacher started carefully, "about what I said earlier-"

"I know," he said waving his hand dismissively. "There are 'resources available'. I know all that." He'd unconsciously parroted the school social worker, maybe just to let the teacher know she wasn't the only young youth professional struck with Savior Syndrome.

"Okay," she lifted her hands as a peace offering. "I won't bring it up again, but if you need anything, you know where to find me."

Joeu snickered internally. _Yep, it's always easier to give a raincheck than to actually do something_.

She paused, probably hoping that Joey would open up and tell her about some abuse going on at home or whatever. "You know, actually," he started hastily, "I think I'd like to do the assignment on my own. I don't think it's going to work with Kaiba."

"You could," she replied too quickly for his tastes, "but that wouldn't be a very good idea."

Joey blinked. In a non-threatening way, she laid a hand on his forearm. Squeezed it a bit, maternal-like. "It's not that I doubt your capacities, Joseph. I think you're a smart young man with great potential. It's not just me - everyone sees it. But I think you'd get more out of the book if you discussed it with someone else."

_Everyone? Who the fuck is 'everyone'? _ "I can come to, um, conclusions on my own. I don't need to be working with Kaiba."

"Speaking of which... I was actually going to thank you for doing that."

Joey blinked. _Doing what exactly?_ Which was vocalized with an eloquent "Huh?"

She smiled a bit bashfully. "I know that things... haven't always been 'harmonious' between the two of you..."

He knit his brows in confusion. Thank you, Mrs. Captain Obvious - why bring that up now?

"I just wanted to say that..." She paused, searching for the right words, as a lot of adults did around him, as if the wrong words would break him. "It's good that you and… you and _Seto_-" she said his name very carefully, as if it was fragile - "it's good that the two of you do this together." She took a fatigued breath, and lowered her eyes to stare at the hand which was touching her pupil. "Again, Joseph, I want you to know that I do not mean to say he's smarter than you are - because he's not. There are a lot of things he doesn't know yet about life." She raised her eyebrows as if to say, you know what I mean, don't you?

But Joey did not. She studied him for a moment, then fell silent. As if she had overdone herself, breached the invisible line between what's appropriate or not; what belongs to the realm of youth or that, more treacherous, of adulthood. He withdrew his arm, and felt the cold air of the room where her hand had lain.

"I… No, I don't really understand."

She glanced at her watch. The next bell was about to ring. She spoke again, this time at a faster and more confident pace. "We just think it's good that you work together on this project. Especially Catcher in the Rye - it's a good book to read at your age, I think. Actually I chose it thinking of you, Joseph," she added, that weird contrite smile tugging at her lips. "And of Seto, too."

He still didn't get it. Why she spoke of Kaiba with such fondness, what mysterious educational benefits she saw in asking two sworn ennemies to frolick over classic American literature. No... It's not that he didn't understand. It's just that he didn't want to dig into the meaning behind her words. So he let it be.

"Uhm, okay."

The door opened, causing the bustle of the ongoing recess to pour freely into the classroom. The teacher raised her index at the probing student. "Just a minute." The door closed back on itself. She turned to Joey. "What you're doing now is more important than you think. Even if you can't see it yet." She reached for him and gave his arm one last, gentle squeeze, put on a hopeful smile for him. "It'll stay with you all your life."

* * *

><p>Joey raided the fridge as soon as he got back home.<p>

In the end, his father wasn't home. Meaning Joey could've come back straight after school. He'd ended up hanging out at the game shop with Tristan as late as he could, which wasn't late since Tristan had to leave pretty early and there was only so much to talk about with Yugi's grandpa – and somehow Joey done with hearing about Yugi's fascinating adventures in professional gaming from seemingly everybody _but_ Yugi.

Joey sighed. He took in the wavering fridge light and its ever-worsening humming-buzzing sound. The milk was still within its expiry date, and there was plenty of cereal. He poured himself a bowl and sat down in front of the TV, just to have something to do watch while he ate. Didn't feel like opening his math textbook. He needed to unwind first. There was still time to do his homework.

This old battered couch was nothing like Kaiba's friggin' Cadillac of a couch. It had springs popping out in the wrong places and Joey always ended up with a sore ass cheek when he stayed in the same spot for too long. Sleeping on that couch was asking for trouble and a sore back for the week to follow.

Joey stood up to pour himself a second bowl and sat back at a different spot, just to give his left butt cheek a break. Television was particularly boring on weeknights after prime time, yet he found himself absorbing whatever was on without paying attention. He stayed put even after he'd finished eating and even though he'd only turned on the TV only to liven up his lonely meal. Didn't feel like doing his homework at all.

One commercial break later, Joey thought he'd heard footsteps outside the door. He turned off the TV immediately. There was no sound. False alarm. His heart still drummed like mad in his ears.

Then he heard a set of keys clattering behind the paper thin door.

Joey sprang up and dashed for the bathroom, locked himself in and was able to start the shower before the apartment door was opened. Joey leaned against the door, willing his heart to calm down.

* * *

><p>He woke up uncharacteristically early the next morning, because he'd gone to bed uncharacteristically early the night before. Kaiba had unwillingly messed up his sleep schedule. Joey lazed around in bed until the sun rose because his body kept telling his brain it needed the rest. There was soreness in his muscles, especially his thighs and lower back. But no matter how hard he tried, he couldn't fall back asleep. Falling asleep in his jeans hadn't helped. But there was something else.<p>

Images of Seto Kaiba kept coming back at him.

Kaiba's bony arms. Kaiba sprawled on a bed too big for him. Kaiba's skin, as pale as his immaculate white sheets. Wiry arms, nicely sculpted hip bones, and the soft bulge between, below them...

Joey had always imagined Kaiba to be more tanned, more muscled. You know, like the other playboy millionaires on the covers of gossip magazines. From their brawling sessions he'd had many occasions to, well, assess Kaiba's physique and he knew he was well built. Maybe it was the perspective that did that and had him see shadow in the wrong places. Or the cold light of dawn, dulled by the grey walls of the room around them.

Come to think of it, they both spent a whole night - that's nearly half a day when you think about it - in the same room. And no fight took place. How weird was that?

When his alarm clock rang, Joey didn't snooze. Got up right away. His father had passed out on the couch and the empty bowl and spoon from yesterday still lay on the living room floor, untouched.

Joey laid the dirty dish on the counter carefully so that the ringing sound of the spoon against the porcelain didn't wake his father. Not that the man was a light sleeper.

This time Joey made sure he brought every school supply he needed. He took off twenty minutes before his usual. Hopefully he'd have time to hang out with Yugi a bit, and ask to copy his math homework before class started. He should've tried to work on it when he had the chance just an hour ago. But his brain wouldn't let him - thinking about a certain CEO was a much more appealing torture.

Damned be Kaiba.


	3. Day Three

When Joey arrived home on Thursday evening he felt like he'd actually _attended_ school for the first time in his life. Or at least in a long, long time.

His teacher's pep talk had an effect on him, and even though he hadn't had any more classes with her today, he felt pumped up for math and science. Took notes. Almost raised his hand once to ask a question. But somebody else raised theirs while he was hesitating, and since they asked the same question he had, it was all good. It actually made him feel kind of smart to know that someone else was wondering the same thing he was, or made him feel less dumb, more accurately. Years of mediocre report cards do that to you.

So he was home early, having declined an offer to chill at the arcade to go straight home and study instead. _Study!_

His dad was nowhere in sight. Not that he minded - he'd had been pretty tame yesterday night.

So he hadn't decided yet whether he was going to take Kaiba's warm invitation or not. He had time to think about it - at least three and a half hours until the bus ride that would eventually take him there. He opened his bedroom door and yanked his backpack on his bed. Couldn't very well study or take decisions on an empty stomach now, could he.

The milk carton in the fridge was empty. Bothersome, because it meant Joey had to go buy some, but on the bright side, that also meant his father was getting something healthy in his stomach. Joey took the cereal out and laid the half open box on the counter. At least there was still some of that. Joey knelt down next to the couch, lifted the cushions to run his hands in every nook and cranny of the furniture to gather whatever coins he could get. Tossing them around in his hand, he estimated he had just over a dollar's worth. He gathered whichever bottles were lying around on counters and near the entrance and that he could hold in his arms, then headed for the corner store.

He came back with a smaller than usual carton of milk. Poured himself cereal, poured half the milk he normally would have, threw some water in to compensate. Seasoned with sugar to taste.

It wasn't half bad. It would do for tonight.

Joey sat in front of the TV and tuned into a news channel. Couldn't really relate to any of it, except maybe the weather forecast. It was going to rain real hard tonight, said the weather person, who sort of looked like one of his aunts on his mother's side.

.

By the time his father came home, Joey had done more than half of some homework that was only due Monday, an achievement in itself.

Joey moved his textbook and loose leaf sheets aside to make room for his father on the couch. "Hey dad."

His father greeted him with a grunt of approval. Undid his shoes, headed straight for the kitchen. "Doing homework in front of the TV?"

"Yeah. Less boring that way." But Joey was well aware that's not what his father had meant to ask. He hadn't meant to ask anything, in fact. He knew better than to stand in his father's way, and was in his bedroom before the old man had retaken his spot on the couch.

.

There was no avoiding it.

Joey couldn't get his mind off Kaiba.

And off the strange advice from his teacher yesterday. It had been nice to have the mindless television programs take these serious matters off his head, but alone in his bedroom, stripped down to his boxers, Joey Wheeler couldn't think about anything else than how his own body looked different than Kaiba's and how he should dress for his visit later tonight.

Yes, yes. A _visit_. Let's call things what they are. But he was only doing it out of civility, some usually demure part of his brain decided just now. He was doing Kaiba a FAVOR. No, not him per se - his teacher. No, himself. He was doing it for himself so that he wouldn't have to feel bad not following the teacher's, er, recommendation.

It wouldn't do to show up just in his jeans and sneakers, he thought. Not after he saw what he saw in that mansion. Kaiba's place was more than that; it was a museum, and Joey sort of felt he had to do the artwork justice. He certainly wasn't feeling inadequate about the things he wore. Strangely, he just wanted to - to _match_ the decor.

He wondered why Kaiba didn't.

The more Joey reminisced his encounter with the CEO in its natural habitat, the more he reminded him of some ruffled crow. Scarecrow, maybe. Yes, that was suiting enough an image. The mighty Kaiba trying to scare everybody off. Hah!

It was astonishing just how long it took Joey to notice. All this time he'd seen Kaiba's repellent diatribes as a series of personal attacks on him. But when you look at it closely, Kaiba didn't know two shits about Joey. Merely a few misconceptions based on what little info he had on him, if anything at all. It was odd to Joey that he have these realizations at this very moment. Maybe getting actual sleep was doing him good.

Joey laid out what few respectable gear he owned on his bed. Wearing the school uniform was out of question. Too amateur. His clean jeans weren't clean enough to his tastes. His 'clean T-shirts' as well - he knew to the wealthy there is no such thing as a 'clean t-shirt'. He owned a polo but he never wore it except when he had brunch on a few select religious holidays with his mother and her boyfriend. Easter, Thanksgiving, things like that. He loathed the polo. Gave him a preppy look that wasn't meant for him. Maybe that was just the hair - his mother wasn't afraid to label it 'mop' whenever it wasn't clean-looking enough to her tastes. Thank God he didn't have to pay filial homage to her on a regular basis.

The minimalist inventory on his bed was to be pitied, really. He'd sometimes get a few snide comments on how he'd never get a girl if he didn't learn to dress up like the other guys. Joey never failed to claim nonchalantly how little he cared. They always assumed that 'oh but girls do care about these things, you'll see one day, you'll see', which made it hard for Joey to repress his snickers. They just didn't get it.

At least he had a couple of next to brand new black socks, the kind that goes with a full suit.

The suit.

The suit! He'd nearly forgotten about its existence.

It laid somewhere in one of the boxes stacked on the hard to reach shelf above his closet. Out of sight, understandably. He remembered what an ordeal it had been to shop around - no, to be hustled around by his emotional mother and aunt, how no single dress shirt seemed to fit in right within the price range the two working class women were looking at. Finally, after much coaxing from the salesperson, they spent more money than they would have liked on not one, but two dress shirts and ties from a better brand, in addition to a suit that would make him look respectable for the funeral.

The whole set was where he remembered it to be, the smaller dress shirt all wrinkled crumpled above the neater, half-a-size-bigger one, stiffly packaged in its pins and cardboard supports. He'd never worn it; his aunt chose it on a whim for him 'so that he could wear it for prom and graduation'.

As if he had any real hopes of graduating for himself, first; and as if he'd want to pay actual money to spend an evening stomaching dances and nostalgic rituals and shit, all the more with some girl he wouldn't really like.

But miraculously, as predicted, the shirt he'd worn just this summer didn't fit nicely anymore. His arms had lengthened without him realizing. It's not like the over-sized school uniforms were a good indicator of teenage growth, although now that he thought about it, it didn't feel so big on him anymore.

He discarded the shirt on the floor, not intent on picking it up and treating it like the noble piece of fabric it was. Plus there was no ironing board in sight in this apartment.

"Let me get you out of here," he said as he began freeing the other shirt from its shackles.

It was an unusual blend of colors for a shirt; equally thick white and olive, vertical stripes. The colored stripes were lined with thinner, embroidered, fern green lines. He remembered liking it more than the first one.

It looked good on him, and as his mother pointed out in one of her rare fits of amiability, it did bring out reddish highlights in his ash-going-on-dirty blond hair.

After stretching out a few minor wrinkles, he decided it was going to be okay and that his cleaner jeans were going to be okay, too. He dumped the suit in the closet and looked for the bus schedule to know which transfer to take to Kaiba Corp.

.

The same maid opened up for it. And if the body guard acted as 'professional' as last time, this lady seemed to remember Joey and perhaps to have anticipated his visit, if KC staff were allowed to feel emotion without suffering paycheck deductions.

"Mister Kaiba is expecting you," she told Joey who thought he saw a sparkle in her eye.

"Yeah, well, he better," he joked. "It's a pain coming to this part of town, you know that?"

The maid smiled wordlessly. Of course she knew. She wasn't the type who could afford living in a neighbourhood like this one. "Actually, I live on the estate now," she said, as if she'd been reading Joey's thoughts, "but in my first years I used to commute, so, yes..."

_Years_? How could anyone survive Kaiba's unpleasantness for _years_?

He followed the maid through this maze from another epoch, intent on memorizing the path to freedom this time. A left, five doors, a door, straight, the portraits hallway, a single draped window next to a peculiar little antique piece of furniture... He took it all in mechanically until they reached the octagonal room.

It was difficult not to be impressed by the new statue - dark and shiny; some metal maybe? - in the middle of the room. Joey interrupted the maid's search for the right key with a question. Hey, what was wrong with doing a bit of chit chat with who was perhaps the only human on the premises whom was willing to partake in it? "This wasn't here before. Is it new?"

The maid turned around. "Oh, that's right, you've never seen it."

"Well, yeah."

The piece was a bit strange; a winged male perched over a young female, both naked except for the draperies around her waist and legs. They were enlacing each other with slender arms, looking as if though they were about to kiss.

"It was taken out for restoration until just yesterday. To me, it's like an old friend coming back home."

"Figures. I'd be surprised if Kaiba had bought it. I mean, he doesn't look like he's into pretty stuff."

The maid smiled peacefully at the snide comment turned compliment.

"Yes, it's been on the estate since before the late Kaiba."

"Like, Kaiba's father?"

"Yes." She stood still despite the silence, like she wasn't ready to go on with her duties just yet. "It's good to have personal visitors. It's like we get to see the estate through new eyes. We get so used to all this beauty that after a while we barely see it anymore."

Joey pondered for a moment. He sort of knew what she meant but couldn't relate to it. "So, um, what is it?"

"Eros and Psyché." She must've seen the look on Joey's face, for she felt the need to clarify: "I know the term 'erotic' means something else nowadays, but back then Eros was the God of love in ancient Greece. Cupid is the one who represents desire. As you can see, we've got it all mixed up."

Joey thought of the baby angel in diapers and a crossbow. "Yeah, I can see that."

The nurse rummaged through her keys again, ready to leave, but Joey was transfixed by the sight of the statue.

"Eros is waking his love with a kiss. It's a long story," she summarized.

"Maybe you can tell me next time," he said with a noncommittal shrug.

She pulled another of her indulgent smiles that left Joey wanting to know more. He had a feeling now was not the time to probe further. He followed her to Kaiba's office, memorizing the rest of his path as they want along.

The lady who considered inanimate works of art to be akin to 'old friends' left without a word, this time, as if Joey wasn't considered a threat anymore, or as if he wasn't worth announcing. Either way, Kaiba was ignoring him even when he gave the wooden door frame two timid knocks, his head buried in his arms, resting on his desk.

Joey swallowed, cleaned his teeth as he waited for a reaction.

"Hey," he called out casually.

No reaction. The regular heaving of Kaiba's chest caused him to reevaluate the situation.

"Hey, moneybags," he said a little louder.

Still no reaction. No doubt about it; he was sleeping. Kaiba was many things, but not someone who'd pretend being asleep in the presence of another person. "Well," he told no one in particular before stepping into the room. If Kaiba let him spend the night in his room and sleep on his couch surely he wouldn't mind that Joey just 'go ahead and come on in'.

The room hadn't changed since last time. Even the blinds were in the exact same position. Instead of heading straight for the couch like he did last time, Joey allowed himself a bit of a self-guided tour. Not like Kaiba would ever go out of his way to give him a tour of the premises. The windows did give in to empty meadowland that stretched to a brick fence, itself punctuated by lamp posts and maybe an observation tower, Joey wasn't sure.

It must feel peaceful in daytime. But now, it mostly looked, and felt, dead.

Kaiba kept sleeping.

Joey walked around the other end of the room, the one with the entertainment system and the leather couches. It gave in to a balcony which he hadn't really paid attention to last time, and massive bookshelves towering on each side. He began browsing through the books, hoping to find the one that had been assigned for class. At least he could get a head start in it while Kaiba was sleeping, it'd be more productive than sulking or snuffing his host's belongings.

And no, Joey still hadn't bought or begun to read the thing - 'Catcher in the Something or Other'.

Unfortunately, it didn't seem to be part of Kaiba's collection. Nor was any regular novel. There wasn't even anything Joey could just pick up and read to pass the time. Not a magazine. Nothing. All he could see were non-fiction best sellers, books on economics, finance, political science, and biographies of major figures in the previous fields. One shelf after another. All hard covers, all recent publications.

Joey shook his head. Ran his tongue over his front teeth, deep in thought. He wrestled with the idea of just waking Kaiba up. Then again, he'd purposely let him sleep the other day. Perhaps he'd like to have the favor returned. Perhaps he didn't like being woken up.

But.

"I'm sorry, buddy, but you're going to have to nap some other time," Joey murmured, taking long, careful strides in Kaiba's direction.

He neared Kaiba's sleeping frame, sent a tentative hand hovering over his bony shoulder. Maybe this wasn't the best way to do it. Kaiba's paranoiac tendencies were certain to have him knock Joey off before he could even open his eyes. Joey rethought his plan. Took a couple of steps back, sighed.

"Moneybags."

He walked to the other end of the desk, looking for something long and pointy he could reach the CEO with. A stapler would do. "Hey moneybags," he repeated, louder this time, wielding the stapler with one extended arm. "Kaiba," he tried, poking the young man in the shoulder.

This earned him a muffled grunt.

"Seto."

His head snapped up. Joey tried to think of a snide remark to throw at him but nothing decent came out and, well, Kaiba's morning face was quite a sight. He looked paler, whiter than usual (transparent? as if there was darkness lurking underneath his skin) if that was even possible. His eyeballs sort of loose in their sockets, lips scarlet from dehydration and his breathing felt a little heavy, as if he'd been extirpated from a dream. Not a good one, obviously.

"You alright, man?"

"Don't touch my stuff," replied Kaiba in an uncharacteristically creaky voice. He cleared his throat and snatched the office supply away. _Someone_ was a possessive jerk...

"Err, what was I _s'pose_ to do? I'm not gonna kiss you awake like you were Sleeping Beauty." Oh Wheeler, the things that come out of your mouth when you try to impress. Joey wanted to slam himself in the forehead. _  
><em>

Kaiba shot him a glare dripping disgust as he placed the stapler at the exact same spot Joey had taken it from. The blond couldn't help but spy at his fingers, which were quickly balled into fists - no, more like curled up. Protectively.

'_Your hands_,' Joey wanted to say, but he said nothing. _Let me see your hands._

Kaiba caught Joey's glance, and flattened his hands on the desk. The twitching in the right index had receded, it seemed.

"Don't touch my stuff, Wheeler."

"Okay, okay, I got it." Joey backed up.

"Any of it."

Joey wasn't going to dignify this with a response. Kaiba's curious state was curiously much more interesting than any insult he could come up with. He looked still dazed although he was doing a good job of hiding it. It made him look vulnerable for some reason, like a cat who just sneezed. He narrowed his eyes at Joey.

"What." He asked, he asked in a remarkably flat voice.

Joey cracked a smile at the 'disoriented cat' mental image. "Nothing." He took a more casual pose, placing his hands in his pockets. "So... Are we going to get anything done at all tonight?"

"Depends on you." Kaiba coughed in his left fist. His whole forearm trembled, even after the impact. Ignoring his guest, he tapped a few keyboard keys on the tray below. Joey heard the low hum of the computer tower regain life.

Kaiba's face was still marked with creases from the ruffles in his clothing. Joey, a veteran of school time napping, recognized 'the marks' immediately.

And then there were the moist bangs sticking to Kaiba's forehead. He found himself craving to move them out of the way.

Kaiba looked up, and their eyes met. Joey did everything to make himself expressionless. Without knowing why. Kaiba's breathing had regained a normal pace, but his glassy eyes stayed intently focused on Joey, unblinking. Something was going on, and Joey now wanted to know more than just '_why did you let me sleep on your couch the other night_'. Kaiba gave no hints as to what might be going on inside his head. Joey didn't know if he was achieving that neutral look he'd been striving for, but Kaiba sure was killing it. Then Joey broke the silence.

"I don't get you."

Kaiba broke into a smil- a smirk. "As if you could."

"Don't think too highly of yourself, moneybags." Joey was surprised at how calm he remained while saying this. He made a mental note of not using the word 'moneybags' too often.

This must've offset Kaiba, because his index started twitching again.

Joey lost all appetite for any banter the other had in store for him. "Just do your stuff and tell me when you're done." He walked casually towards the comfy spot. "Oh, and tell me how to use the TV." _I'd hate to fall asleep waiting - and why exactly did we.._. _have this sort of accidental sleepover together?_ Joey swept the question away. _Nah. Some other time_.

"The remote is under the coffee table. And you forgot your peasant money," Kaiba drifted off without finishing his sentence.

"M'yeah," Joey muttered as he took seat in the other section of the couch, the one he hadn't dozed off in.

Also, the section that was more conveniently placed right before the short table. "Mind if I put my feet on...? I'll take my shoes off."

Kaiba gave him no answer. But somehow, Joey felt like that was answer enough. He took off his shoes and made himself at home, crossing his legs at the ankles on the elevated surface. He uncrossed them a second later, realizing he wasn't flexible enough to reach for the remote in that position. Next to it was the change that had been meant to be his bus fare the other day. He pocketed the 'peasant money' without shame, not caring that Kaiba was hearing the clattering of the coins, and probably seeing some kind of victory in that gesture.

Meh. It wasn't his problem what opinions Kaiba might hold.

Yet Joey couldn't suppress a frown as soon as he regained his initial position. Even the act of zapping through channels more numerous than he could fathom did nothing to make his mood brighter. Somehow, Kaiba had managed to ruin his mood. Again.

_Goddamn it_, Joey Wheeler. _He doesn't give a damn. He doesn't give a damn about your fucking change or your fucking dress shirt that you wore to impress him because yes, admit it, you couldn't stand not looking a fraction as good as he does. You don't matter to him and you're not a part of his world and he just ticks you off because he knows he can. You're not even worth the distraction, he barely pays attention to you._

Kaiba had this way of working his way through his mind and wrecking everything completely. He barely had to do anything; it was maddeningly effortless how he could get Joey to work himself up and get generally pissed at himself and the world in general.

"I'm done."

This took Joey by surprise.

"Yeah, okay." Joey needed a moment to shake whatever just happen off. "I'm just going to... finish that round." Without realizing he'd landed on a female tennis channel.

"They're called sets."

Joey stayed silent. He wasn't in the least interested in the technicalities of a sport that had thick-thighed women running around in mini-skirts. Not that it wasn't fun to look at.

"If it's any consolation, most people watch it for the same reasons." Kaiba's voice had regained its smug smoothness. Looked like the CEO had recovered from his dazed after-nap state, and was up for banter again, more or less insinuating that Joey wasn't into tennis sets, but tennis _players_. He couldn't be more wrong.

"Fuck that," Joey snapped, turning off the television set. "Do you have the book or not," he said impatiently, not looking at Kaiba.

"I do."

"Okay, well, let's get this over with."

"There isn't much left to do. Maybe retype the essay. I can handle that."

Then Joey turned to look at Kaiba. "Uhh... Huh?"

"I have done this assignment in the past." Kaiba's voice and posture were level, nothing like the moribund doll he looked like minutes ago. Joey started to suspect that he'd pretended to have something to do on the computer just to regain his composure. But he'd never know, because Joey was the one who assumed Kaiba had been busy before falling asleep on his desk. Perhaps Kaiba had simply taken the opportunity.

Joey sat back and sighed, exasperated. "Tell me why I'm here again?"

"... It's a team assignment," Kaiba replied one minute too late.

Joey clicked his tongue. "Look, man. I'm not looking for a fight- just, like..." He struggled with words. "You're acting weird, alright?"

When Kaiba didn't immediately jump in, Joey continued.

"I mean... You let me sleep on your couch and shit." He lowered his voice as if he didn't want to be overheard. He wasn't going to dive into the health thing, because it'd imply that he'd been studying Kaiba. "I mean, we've always been like, enemies or whatnot and-"

"Then you don't know what 'enemy' means," Kaiba dropped, coldly.

"You don't know that." Joey was lucky that Diesel's gang let him be as long as he stayed out of their way.

But okay, Kaiba wouldn't go after his life or anything like that. Maybe-

"Okay, maybe not enemies, but... See, you're doing it again." That thing he does. Changing subjects mid-argument and making _Joey_ sound stupid for it.

Kaiba gave him a slight sideways look. Joey was sick of the mind games, of Kaiba changing subjects, acting like a dick one minute but not the next, and getting away with it all.

"Look..." Joey exhaled deeply. "I don't know, I don't care, okay?" He said tiredly. "Maybe you're in for the fights and stuff, but I'm tired of that, really, I'm over all of that. I was young and stupid... Yeah, I hated you and maybe you're going to be a dick forever but I can't bring myself to care anymore. Things happened and I grew out of it. I grew up, I guess."

He was getting off track, remembered the assignment, that he should get out of here A.S.A.P. before the last bus leaves so then he bould go back home and bulk on sleep for tomorrow's shift.

Joey pinched his nose bridge to quell a threatening headache and let his head fall back on the couch, closing his eyes. He wished he could have some Red Bull right now. "Christ, I've got other things to do..."

Then silence.

Silence felt good.

Neither of them had to say anything. Joey certainly wasn't going to insist. If he hadn't made himself clear enough, then-

Faint metallic clicks came from Seto's direction. Joey recognized the sound of a drawer opening. Paper being ruffled. Then, the previous sounds again, in reverse order.

Then nothing. Kaiba apparently wasn't going to do a thing.

Joey didn't want to be doing this all on his own, to drag Kaiba along, to force him to cooperate. Really, he could just tell his teacher that he'd tried to be agreeable, to work with Kaiba and that it didn't happen! He'd hand in his own half-assed version of the paper, or maybe ask for an extension to do his own, and have a clear conscience.

His teacher had said something about Kaiba. Couldn't recall the exact wording, but it amounted to something around the lines of 'Kaiba isn't as smart as he lets on'.

Joey heard the swivel chair, then Kaiba's footsteps approaching. He opened his eyes to see Kaiba taking place next to him, in the very spot he'd let his guest doze off earlier this week.

On the CEO's lap, a bright yellow file, with its edges curled up and worn out, that he set down between himself and Joey.

"It's in there."

The riddles again. Joey decided he would indulge Kaiba and let him have it its way. "You mean the book is in there?"

No response.

"The essay?"

Still nothing. Joey sighed and grabbed the thing, checking Kaiba's face for hints of disapproval. So far he seemed to be doing the right thing. Inside the file was a stack of stapled loose leaf sheets, on which were neatly handwritten essays. The sheets were of an old brand, and had significantly yellowed over time, too.

'_What's this?_' Joey wanted to ask but didn't, knowing he would never get an answer.

The dates read eight, nine, sometimes ten years ago. 'War and Peace'. 'Cien años de soledad'. 'Les Misérables'. These were essays. Some written in languages that weren't English. If the date was right, Kaiba would have made these when he was around ten, or younger. And they were perfect, just like the last sentence of a page when Joey was made to copy a sentence thirty times in detention. No child could write this perfectly. Joey flipped the pages to find grades. Nothing. No red pen. These hadn't been graded. Had Kaiba written these in his spare time? For fun? What this the idea genius kids had of a good time? And more importantly, why was Kaiba letting him see-

No. Seto Kaiba didn't simply 'let people see' things. This was his way of _showing_ him this. Joey kept rifling through the stacks, hoping to find anything related to 'The Catcher...' Heck, he didn't even remember the author's name. He wanted to find the essay Kaiba had written ten years in advance for a teacher who thought it would be beneficial for them both to...

The Catcher in the Rye.

A ten page essay, dated exactly ten years and a month ago. What on Earth prompted an eight year old child to come up with something like this? This was twice as long as what the teacher was asking for.

Her voice rang clear in his head. 'It'll stay with you all your life.'

Joey looked up to see Kaiba, immobile, his blank gaze lost somewhere in the room.

_All your life._


	4. Day Three II

It was unsettling to see his rival like this. His... _former_ rival. In no way it would feel fair to fight the man in his current state.

"Kaiba," Joey called out, to draw the man from his trance.

It didn't work immediately. Kaiba's eyes first regained their focus. He kept them glued to the floor, blinking a few times. "What are you looking at," Joey inquired, lowering his hand, the one holding the paper, onto his lap. Kaiba shot him one of those looks that was meant to discredit his interlocutors, as if Joey had just asked something stupid. The blond merely shrugged.

"What are we going to do with this?"

"I'll type it up-" Kaiba coughed the creakiness off his voice "-and I'll make a few adjustments."

"No."

Kaiba narrowed his eyes dubiously, waiting for Joey to explain himself. "It's a pain coming to this part of town, you know that?" Joey snickered.

"What's so funny," Kaiba asked dryly, looking impatient.

"Nothing. It's just that I said the exact same thing to your maid."

"Clarissa."

"That's her name?"

"Of my Head of Housekeeping, yes."

"Oh." Joey once hypothesized cold-hearted Kaiba would force his employees to renounce their names and get a bar code tattooed on their napes. Funny how this idea wasn't so... _funny _anymore. The man before him didn't strike Joey as the cool, calculating person he once was to him. There was a human behind that facade, and in that human, perhaps, a heart. One whose designs were locked away in a secure place.

He drank in the slightly feeble Kaiba sitting in front of him. Images of his frail upper body, his pallid skin invaded his mind, and Joey made sense of them like a collage. They matched the man in front of him perfectly. How he hadn't reconciled the two Kaibas earlier shocked him. An unexpected wave of compassion washed over Joey. And perhaps, because of that peculiar state of mind, he sensed that a breach appeared between himself and Kaiba, like a tumultuous sea was parting for a brief moment. Joey wanted to seize that chance.

"You know, I used to think you were an asshole," he blurted out.

"What makes you think I care about your thoughts on the matter?"

Joey sighed at Kaiba's unpleasantness. "Because you let me in. To this," he added, pointing to the yellow file.

A second later, Kaiba was up and stalking to his desk.

Joey stayed behind with the fragments of Kaiba's childhood exposed. He arranged them somewhat neatly into the file, setting the 'Catcher in the Rye' essay aside.

"Come," commanded Kaiba impatiently. "If you're going to complain that I make you waste your time, might as well put that primitive brain of yours to work."

"Prick," Joey retorted, but he stood up and followed Kaiba anyway.

"Bring the essay," Kaiba added without looking at Joey.

"I've _got _it, who do you think I am, an idiot?"

Kaiba, already seated in his swivel chair, swung around to look at the blond nearing him. he tilted his head to the side, lowered his gaze, and opened his mouth as if to retract himself. But that was the moment Joey chose to hitch himself up on the desk. Kaiba's lips sealed themselves. He frowned.

Joey got off and retreated to the corner of the desk. Standing on his left leg, he rested his right hip on the hard surface. He didn't want to just hang around like an idiot while Kaiba had his own seat, nor did he want to kneel or sit on the ground or something humiliating like that. He didn't know what amazed him the most; that Kaiba didn't have the decency to bring his guest a chair, that he perhaps didn't have such one extra chair to lend him, or that he let Joey get away with half-sitting on his work desk.

"I don't have all night."

"Excuse me?"

"Is this the moment you tell me you're illiterate?" Kaiba asked, his voice slightly louder.

"Oh fuck you, Shakespeare," Joey said without conviction, more for good measure than to really come at Kaiba. "Why were you even writing these anyway," he continued. "I don't know about you, but I had better things to do with my time, when I was ten, than to write essays on Shakespeare or whatnot."

Then it looked like Kaiba lost all interest for the human being next to him, clicking his mouse, squinting at the screen like he was alone in the room. When Joey exhausted, in his mind, the list of possible comebacks he could use to get out of this strange rut, Kaiba deigned address him again.

"It's that thing you never really cared for - _education_," Kaiba said in a distant voice.

"Okay, yeah well, whatever you say." Joey gave up. These pointless micro-arguments were getting the best of him. Better not engage in Kaiba's taunting.

Not caring felt surprisingly good. From the corner of his eye, Joey saw - thought he saw - Kaiba's shoulder droop a little. The tension between them vanished. But perhaps Joey was imagining things. _Oh man. I just want this to be over with.  
><em>

Kaiba sat at attention.

When Joey opened his mouth to come up with, well, he wasn't sure what exactly, anything to break the tension between them _for good_, Kaiba interrupted him.

"Just dictate - pardon me, please _read_ the damn thing to me."

"Alright, look, I know what 'dictate' means, alright? Plus, can't you have a secretary type it for you? This is like, a waste of time." Joey wished he could master the art of not caring. Giving in to Kaiba's anger really wasn't helping.

"I'm not going to waste shareholder funds because you want to go to the arcade."

"I work twenty, sometimes thirty hours a week. You can't pull that shit on me. I won't let you call me lazy."

Kaiba's eyebrows raised. The news seemed to have genuinely surprised him. Perhaps it was the finality in Joey's voice. Joey remembered the conversation he'd had with - well, that had been _imposed upon _by - his teacher. "I'm just saying," Joey started again, not so defensively this time, "I'm not all that fond of schoolwork and all, but we might as well try and come up with something new. I don't really feel like I've achieved anything by doing this."

Except maybe putting up with Kaiba, learning new strategies to put up with the prick. Kaiba 101. Heheh.

"It'll _educate_ you," he said smugly.

"Give me a break, man, I'm not here to get 'education' from you. I'm already putting myself through school for that."

"Schools don't actually teach you anything. Everything I know I learned outside the education system."

"Then why do you even bother? To come and pick fights with me? Your shrink wants you to hang out with people your age?" As if Kaiba would _ever_ take anyone's advice.

Kaiba tsked at Joey. "Everything that could be said about that book has been said, and this,' he pointed to the yellowish bundle of sheets, "has most of it. Just _read_ it already."

Joey sighed, unconvinced, and increasingly too tired to want to argue. Kaiba was playing this tug of war with him and neither of them seemed to know what was at stake for the winner.

"You can always reflect on it," Kaiba amended, without looking up.

"Oh fuck off, man. Like I'm going to look up to something you wrote when you were ten."

"Eight."

"Same. Whatever. Why - why did you even _do_ this?"

"Education," Kaiba repeated stubbornly, quickly this time, putting an effective end to Joey's questioning. "_Real _education."

Okay, what exactly was that supposed to mean? Joey quickly decided it pointless to pry any further. He'd just be ignored if he tried, anyway. Joey licked his lips, took a deep breath, squinted and started reading. And Kaiba's lithe fingers began tapping along, the right index waltzing on its own, as always.

The blond has no difficulty reading the child's clear handwriting. _Too_ perfect even - all the little 'a's and 't's looking exactly the same. The faint light of the room made it difficult, and Kaiba turned the desk lamp on as if reading Joey's mind, who uttered a silent thank you, wondering strangely if Kaiba would hear it, too. Well, if he did, he gave no evidence of it.

Maybe he'd just uttered a silent you're welcome. Joey had no idea, he was no mind reader. He was, though, brewing up a lot of nonsense right now. Kaiba gave him an expectant look. _'Well?'_

"Oh, sorry, I'll keep reading. Erm..."

Joey looked for the words on the page, focusing on the wraith-like remnants of childhood encased in each letter inscribed on the dessicated sheets.

Kaiba stole a glance at him. Joey caught it and his gaze met Kaiba's, whose features had softened slightly. After a stretching, three second long truce, Joey went on dictating. He made sure to monitor his own reading speed, making appropriate pauses to give Kaiba a chance to catch up. The process was going smoothly when he flipped the page.

But instead of waiting to hear Kaiba's typing stop, Joey found himself waiting for his repeated striking of the backspace key.

That twitching finger, no doubt, was ruining everything for him. No wonder Kaiba had been behind schedule on Joey's first visit. And to think of the pride of the man, unwilling to blame his loss of productivity on this new handicap.

Joey wanted to say 'sorry for pushing you, man, I didn't know'. More like, 'I should have known.' He knew very well this apology - or any form of perceived pity on Kaiba's part - wasn't welcome.

So instead, he stated that "You should let me type, Kaiba." His suggestion was unsurprisingly met with a scoff.

"No, really."

"You can't type, you _hammer_ at the keys." Clearly Kaiba wasn't ready to relinquish his role. Being in charge of the machine made him feel like he had the upper hand.

"Whatever, it'll be faster that way. You finger..." He stopped, not wanting to ruffle any feathers. He congratulated himself at how deft he'd become, perhaps from all those months being around the Prick Supreme, trying to fend his verbal and physical attacks.

Kaiba didn't budge, unsure what course of action to take. To the oblivious onlooker, he appeared stoic, but a lack of reaction from Kaiba was a sign in itself to Joey. He jumped off the desk, stepped closer to Kaiba expectantly.

"Come on."

And without further comment, Kaiba stood, making way for the blond who managed to hide his surprise. It felt weird to sit in Kaiba's ergonomic chair, to feel the warmth where the other man had sat not long ago. Said man had now walked away to another corner of the room.

Joey sighed, exasperated. _Whatever, Kaiba. Play by your own rules, like a flipping three years old. _

Slowly, mouthing a handful of words from the sheet, Joey picked up where his team mate had left. He was going to curse his very, very short term memory when Kaiba came back, setting right next to him with a folding chair. _Well well. What do we got here? _The hint of a smug... _grin _on Kaiba's face?

An imagined one, perhaps, but one that made it impossible for Joey to get angry.

"I knew you were just being a dick," Jou said casually, earning another of Kaiba's blank faces that indicated he was seriously wondering what was going on. "No way Seto Kaiba could ever lack furniture," he explained.

"You only had to ask."

"Not my job to ask. You're the host." Joey risked a smile. "And a crappy one at that."

"Only to you."

Joey turned to look at Kaiba disbelievingly; no, amused, almost. Was Kaiba making a pass at him? Joey's heart rate went up. Wait, what?

"Okay." Bravo. Brilliant. What eloquence, Joey Wheeler!

"Okay, um, your turn," he asked Kaiba. "Get going, Mister... Literature." The more anxious Joey grew, the lamer the insults. That much he'd learned about himself up to now. What he didn't know yet was why Kaiba's presence made him all jittery. Kaiba was acting weird and he didn't like it; didn't like not knowing why.

He positioned his fingers on the keyboard, waiting for Kaiba to pick up the essay. No ruffling sound came. The dictation resumed. Each word was weighted, the rhythm was perfect, so that Joey never made Kaiba wait for him despite his relatively low typing speed. He was extremely careful not to make any mistakes, and had so far avoided the backspace key, certain as he was that its use would induce ridicule from the CEO's part.

Soon enough, they slid into a comfortable pattern. Kaiba's voice was smooth and his enunciation, just right for the task at hand. Joey fell in synch Kaiba's uncharacteristically low voice. He found himself listening to the man's breath intakes, and then became aware of his own. He then tried to match their breathing, a thing he often did when he watched action movies, panting after a race or battle. Just a little idiosyncrasy he thought no one else had.

After having written out at least three pages worth of text, Joey turned to Kaiba to see how many pages they'd gone through. He'd almost lost track of it, too focused to hear the crinkle of paper being manipulated.

"Three pages and two lines," Kaiba answered.

"No, look, that's the first page still." He pointed at the essay, laying flat on the table.

"I don't need to read it."

"What do you mean," Joey asked stupidly, without trying to figure it out on his own.

"_I_ wrote this," stated Kaiba with finality.

"And?"

"I know everything there is to know about this text."

"Sorry, I'm not following you," he said calmly.

Then as Kaiba unfolded his arms (and uncrossed his legs; Joey couldn't help but glance at his crotch), Joey understood. Kaiba knew it by heart. What in the- "You mean you actually _m- memorized_ this?"

"Not exactly."

"Not exactly...?"

"Can't you ever read between the lines, Wheeler?"

Kaiba's terse impatience was punctuated with pleading. Almost. Maybe. "I've writ- I've read this so many times. Thought I'd forgotten it, but it came back to my mind just now," Kaiba calmly explained.

Joey stayed silent. Kaiba continued. "Surely there's a song you used to like, and you listened to it over and over again."

Joey nodded, not too sure where this was going.

"Same for me. If you will." Kaiba's tone, neither demeaning nor condescending, made it a bit more enjoyable for Joey to be in the room. Like a window had opened out of nowhere, giving a little bit of fresh air, and a little more room to breathe.

Room for dialogue, maybe. It seemed to be the emerging pattern between them; from fists and jibes, their relation now was defined by jibes and... Something else Joey didn't have a word for just yet.

Not that he understood why, either.

"So..." Joey searched for the right words. "You learned this... Because you actually liked this?" He asked, not convinced.

"Not quite," answered Kaiba, leaning his (own) right elbow on the desk. "I can't say I really enjoyed it. Even though it was better than the rest of what I had to do."

"The rest...?"

"It felt like recess, if you will."

"Re- _what_?" Joey didn't try to hide his surprise.

Kaiba gave away an small, impassionate smile. "Recess. Yes." Kaiba sat back and let his gaze float around, looking like he was reminiscing something.

Joey didn't particularly enjoy playing detective, but Kaiba must've been willing to disclose such private aspects of his life, albeit in a rather cryptical way. "So you didn't do that for fun."

Kaiba thought for a moment. "Not 'fun' in the sense that _you_ mean it."

"How do you know how _I_ mean it," Joey shot back, pretty proud of himself for once.

"How do you..." Kaiba seemed to give Joey's argument sometime. "I don't know. Meaning I didn't do it of my own initiative," he admitted.

Joey decided he didn't want to press any further.

"I'd say I envy you in a way, Joey Wheeler."

"No, Kaiba, you don't _envy_ me. Are you trying to pick a fight? 'Cause you aren't really-"

"How do _you_ know whether I envy you or not?"

"I know because... you don't _know_ me, okay? You like to think you know everything, Kaiba, but you don't know me."

"And yet I might know something that you don't."

"Know something that I don't." Great, Joey, parroting Kaiba certainly won't make you look smarter. "Look, man, I'm trying to read between the lines, but I can't."

"I wished you would. You're making this very difficult for me, mutt."

"Oh _fuck you_ and your mutt-"

Kaiba's hand was on Joey's knee. Just like that. And it sent a pleasant shiver run through the blond's spine. _What-_

From the bright, concentrated light of the desk lamp, Joey could see Kaiba's chest heaving in rapid, shallow strokes. He was staring hard at his guest, scrutinizing him almost, waiting for him to make his move.

'That' finger began twitching again.

_Why am I here_, Joey's mind called out. _What am I doing here_. _Why am I here? God must be testing me or something. _

Instead of a healthy urge to run away of yell _I'M NOT GAY_, Joey felt a warmth creeping up to his groin. The contact on his thigh was not... unpleasant to him. Kaiba was either unaware of this, or was actually quite skilled at this 'reading between the line' thing he'd mentioned earlier on.

Kaiba's touch lightened, grazing only against the fabric of Joey's pants. He shifted to the edge of his chair.

And that damn twitching finger was driving Joey crazy. He wanted nothing more than to swat it on the spot, like he would an insect.

So he did.

_I hate the idea that part of you is... _weak_. _

Kaiba's hand initially tensed under his.

After a minute's worth of Joey's patience or maybe curiosity - the blond didn't know himself - he allowed himself to relax under the blond's hold.

And the shaking sensation stopped. Kaiba exhaled, a burden coming visibly off his shoulders.

They shared silence.

Joey waited, parting his lips to speak, only to close them again when he realized what he wanted to ask was what he should be doing next.

_What do you expect me to do, Kaiba? _

Not once taking his eyes off Joey's, Kaiba slid off his chair.

He fell to his knees with a light thud.

Without realizing, Joey moved his legs apart to make room for him. Kaiba was kneeling before him. His heart rate sped up imperceptibly.

Kaiba now kept his gaze low, not meeting Joey's. His left hand came resting on Joey's other thigh, as gently as before.

Then he sat back on his ankles, resting his forehead against Joey's knee.

The blond contemplated the bizarre scene he was a part of, unable to move. Or rather, unwilling to move. This was the man who wouldn't be seen in any kind of vulnerable position. This was the man who didn't pull his punches on Joey.

He was also somehow letting Joey in his own secret garden, one grass blade at a time.

Kaiba's breathing became labored again. He freed his hand from Joey's, lifting it heavily, making it creep further up Joey's thigh. And Joey watched himself being molested, fascinated. The warmth spread to his loins.

This was more than simply arousing on a sexual level. This wasn't about Joey's body reacting to stimuli.

There was something intimate about this on an emotional level. But he didn't quite put it in those words. Not yet.

Seto paused, looked up at Joey, who realized a minute too late he'd been tacitly asking for permission to move on. Joey also realized a minute too late he'd been letting Kaiba's fingers crawl all the way to his ...

"Wait."

No, this wasn't about _waiting_. Waiting implied resuming, and no funny business was happening between himself and Kaiba any time soon. Joey'd been puzzled by the strange behavior of the man, and perhaps lost much of his will to confront him, but he had to draw a line. As compelling as it was, it wasn't in the natural order of things for Seto Kaiba to kneel before Joey Wheeler.

"You're asking for a lot here."

Joey couldn't believe the sliver of authority in his own voice.

Kaiba might have stopped breathing.

"I'm not... into that kind of thing, Kaiba," he explained, increasingly ill a ease. He wondered why he was actively trying to soften the blow of rejection. The conscious part of his brain hadn't processed that, one: he was rejecting and Kaiba and that two, Kaiba was _asking_ for something in the first place.

Joey gently pried Kaiba's hands off his lap and used his legs to push himself back, rolling the swivel chair away from his its dejected owner. The blond stood up, stayed silent a few minutes, and walked around the kneeling man, still as a statue.

"Good night, Kaiba."

And he left, as quietly as he could, as if he were to disturb the spirits who kept Kaiba company at night.


	5. Day Four

Fifty minutes later, Joey got home to an unlocked door and a half-unconscious patriarch.

He'd never thought that he'd once in his life actually _welcome_ the sight of his father, sprawled out on the couch in front of a muted television set. Anything to relieve his of the suffocating thoughts he'd had on the way home. Joey must have replayed, helpless, fragments of that nauseatingly touching scene at least a thousand times in his head. Kaiba's thick eyelashes, his worn out features, his spindly hands and the relentless tremor in his fingers, every image shone bright in his mind's eye; the man had exposed himself to the blond, yet his motives remained a mystery.

_Why me? Why now?_

And what... did Kaiba want?

Joey looked at the images of the nondescript late night show shifting, casting shadows on his father's features. The man had one was clutching the front of his shirt, raising and falling softly at every breath. Joey concluded he must have had a bad fit of acid reflux, then made a mental note of checking for antacids in the cabinet. He'd do that tomorrow before leaving for school. Not now - the lights in the bathroom were connected to the fan and the combination of light and sound would wake the man up.

A flashing red dot on the counter attracted Joey's attention.

There was a message on the answering machine.

With practiced ease he swiftly grabbed the device and slid its wires under his bedroom door, shut said door behind him and pressed the 'play' button.

He lowered the volume as his mother's high pitched voice came blasting off the tiny speakers. It was the usual reminder to attend the bi-monthly, Saturday brunch with her and her 'friend from church' - man, he hated the _hypocrisy _of the term - and to attend mass with them the next day.

Except this time there was no mass to be had, it was something-or-other for the cure. It was naturally implied that Elaine Wheeler expected her son to fully commit to the one thing that reminded him he'd lost a family member to cancer. He didn't understand why his mother insisted on putting herself through that - hadn't she lost a daughter in this fight, too? Perhaps, Joey thought, it was a way of making herself feel less guilty, some form of redemption or another. That wasn't his life philosophy. As far as he was concerned, these charities everyone worked so hard for did nothing to prevent his sister's death. He owed them nothing.

Besides, Joey was scheduled for two evening shifts that weekend. Friday right after school and Saturday until midnight. These fundraisers typically started out excruciatingly early and Joey knew he wouldn't have had much sleep to run half a dozen miles for the sake of strangers. Not that he was a selfish asshole - it's just that he had more than enough on his own plate already.

Joey let himself fall flat on his bed, staring at the ceiling, leisurely immersing himself in the darkness of his bedroom.

He missed his old life.

Not that it was a particularly _fun_ one. He wished he got to know his baby sister a bit better before she vanished. (How the fuck do you even get cancer in your _eyes_?) He wished he didn't have to pay his dad's bills for him. He wished he could still loiter at the mall and the arcade with the gang. Even Anzu. Yugi, more or less the official King of Games, traveled more and more across the country for pro tournaments, so he'd opted for private tutoring to finish his degree. (Like he really needed the high school diploma at this point, anyway). And whenever Yugi wasn't taken with gaming or public appearances, he devoted much of his time to some long distance relationship Joey and the gang had yet to meet in person. They knew it was a man and that he'd met Yugi in the dueling ring. As for Tristan, well, he was getting more and more serious about the military and his time for the the Reserve was eating much of his free time outside of school. And while Anzu was fun to be around and all, hanging with her alone didn't make much sense whenever Yugi or Tristan weren't there, too. Same for Ryou. Same for Otogi. If it weren't for fucking work and school Joey wouldn't have lost sight of his friends.

Joey closed his eyes.

Kaiba.

He'd _rejected _Kaiba.

That much was clear to him, now. _Okay, Kaiba made a pass at me, and I rejected him._ Who knew he was gay?

His chest felt tight. He closed his eyes, but the mental images couldn't go away. He imagined Kaiba's hands crawl up to his... to his...

Joey felt jittery.

He had to think of something else.

There were magazines under his mattress, but they were out of the question. They were out of reach, considering the noise he'd have to make to recover them, and how he'd have to turn on the lights and potentially wake his father up. Joey only owned a few of these magazines and knew them inside and out anyway. They were like old pals to him, every image engraved in his brain. He unzipped his increasingly tight pants, giving himself two firm strokes. He was only half mast, probably due to the amount of running he'd done. Or out of nervousness. But he still wasn't completely _soft_. Probably due to some of the thoughts that were wafting over him.

Joey tried to summon an image he'd gotten fixated over lately. Two blondes, licking a thick, dark dick. That pic was nice because, well, it was pretty close up. Joey didn't really care for the girls' faces, or the fact that they were actual _girls_. Maybe their tongues - he could imagine them flickering around the base of the shaft and balls. Joey swallowed, getting slightly harder and enjoying it. Yes. _There_. He picked up a slow, solid pace, feeling his balls rock in the rhythm of his ministrations. In his mind he saw one of the girls making way for the other, who in turn engulfed the man's length in one stroke, then pulling away. The two girls kissed each other around the cock's girth. It might not make sense anatomically, but in his mind's eye, it was hot as hell to see a thick, dark cock being lovingly nursed, wet and glistening with saliva. Aw yeah.

Then it occurred to Joey, out of the blue, that Kaiba had wanted to blow him.

_Fuck_.

Joey winced. He restarted the scenario anew. But somehow the memory of the... well, the _feeling_ of Kaiba's hand on his knee came forth again. Now it was undoing Joey's pants. Kaiba was now on his knees, resting his forehead against Joey's naked knee, hip, kissing the soft skin there. Then-

_I'm _fantasising_ about the bastard. _

Fuck. _Fuck_.

Joey opened his eyes. He let go of his cock, fisted his hands really hard until his tensing muscles ached. And for the next few minutes Joey did nothing but breathe in and out, just to give his heart a chance to rest.

His cock kept twitching on its own, no matter how hard Joey willed the mental images to go away. Giving up on, or maybe _refusing to_ give himself any release in this situation, Joey slipped out of his hoodie and pants, undid the buttons out of his dress shirt, secured his boxers back in place and slid under the covers.

He spent the next two hours fully awake, fending off all thoughts Kaiba-related until his consciousness ebbed away.

.

Joey woke up with a massive morning wood and the slow, but dreadful realization that today was... a school day.

A little less preoccupied by his father, Joey made himself toast, casting an occasional glance at the sleeping man. He turned the TV off to save on electricity, confirmed that the antacid bottle was empty and mentally bid his father goodbye. Joey locked the door behind him before setting off for school, a half-munched toast hanging at his teeth.

He found himself looking for Kaiba as he entered English class (five minutes late). To both his surprise and delight, the fantasy intruder was nowhere in sight. That delight soon churned into guilt, and Joey slumped rather than sat down in the first available seat. The very seat in which Kaiba had been last time he'd seen him in school.

Was it some kind of sign? Joey wasn't into astrology like his mother was, but the coincidence was just _jarring_. The teacher had to repeat his name twice during the attendance call. That earned him a few sympathetic giggles, including one from a cute girl he knew liked him. _Well, I'm sorry to disappoint_, he though as he gave her a polite, casual smile. Tracey Simmonds didn't know the man she was after very well, despite going way back - they'd been hanging around the same people since grade school.

Joey got slightly nervous when the teacher started going over how proud she was of everyone's work. Was there some new homework he wasn't aware of? Or was the due date for the team assignment today? That was _bad_. They'd gotten nothing done, and surely Kaiba not only didn't give a care in the world for the requirements of the public education system, he also had every reason not to do something for a man who'd walked out on him after he made himself as vulnerable as possible in the intimacy of his very own bedroom.

The teacher discussed a few exemplary papers she'd read quickly, and singled out a few teams who'd picked similar books or similar themes in their own interpretations.

It took Joey a few minutes to realize that the rest of the classroom had handed in their copies just before he got to class. He froze when the teacher mentioned his name again.

"Youth is a popular theme, but there's different stages of youth. For example, we have Joey and Seto who focused on _teenagehood _specifically." She looked at Joey expectantly, hoping for him to elaborate maybe, like a few of the other students had a minute before. Joey looked left and right, swallowed, then nodded vigorously before agreeing.

"Y- Yeah."

The teacher gave him a small smile before going on with her list, and how promising the papers looked, and how she might be able to get their copies graded for next Tuesday or Thursday. Joey couldn't quite wrap his mind around what had happened - had Kaiba come in to school just to hand in the thing, then left? Or had he intended to stay, then left when he saw Joey wasn't going to come, because he'd assumed Joey wouldn't come because he was embarrassed because of...

Joey shook his head. He was overthinking this, no doubt.

When he slowly packed his things at the end of the class, the teacher approached him. "Do you have a minute, Joey?"

"Uh, yes..."

He sat back down, intimidated maybe by the teacher's strange tone of voice.

She asked the last student leaving to close the door behind her. When she was sure they were alone, and unbotheres, she started talking more openly. "So! How did things go with Kaiba?" Her curious, enthusiastic eyes made Joey want to squirm. He felt bad.

"I went to his place, uh, twice."

"Did you guys get along?"

Joey sighed and allowed himself to give a more straightforward answer, at least to him. "I don't really know."

The teacher paused to give him a pensive look.

"He's not a bad guy, I guess," he added to break the silence.

She nodded, deep in thought. "What Kaiba sent me by email yesterday looks very good. It looks like you were able to come over your differences, after all."

Er... What?

Misunderstanding the situation, the teacher assumed she'd simply gone too far into personal territory, and didn't expect a reply from Joey.

"Well, it sure looks like you did." She paused again. "You know, I think it was a good idea to compare the book to One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest."

"Y-yeah," Joey grunted noncommittally. He wasn't really sure what she was talking about.

"I didn't know you had seen that movie. I can recommend books on that topic, if you want. Is is something that you'd like?"

Huh-oh. Over zealous savior syndrome alert. Joey froze. He didn't really know what to say to that. Or rather, he really didn't know what to say to that.

On one hand, it would have been easy to just go along with it and show enthusiasm for the idea. There was only good in it for him, and she'd probably go easier on him, when grading and such for example, if she knew he was being such a diligent student. If he went the extra mile for himself, and for her.

Whether Joey Wheeler was an ambitious extra-miler was up for debate. But he wasn't one who took advantage of people or situations.

He wasn't a liar, for one.

First of all, because he just wasn't _like that_. It wasn't right.

Secondly, _one_ lie meant having to come up with _more lies_ more to cover up the first one, and if there's one valuable lesson Joey'd learned from his parents (or rather, from their mistakes), is that getting tangled in lies was little more than a plan to ruin your life and that of the people around you.

So he lowered his eyes. "I'm sorry. I don't... know a thing about the cuckoo's nest." He lifted up his eyes to meet her gaze. "Kaiba wrote all of that. I haven't even read the book yet."

By now his voice was barely audible in the backdrop of the students' raucous in the hallway.

It was no easy - no _fun_ thing to read his teacher's disenchantment on her face, but he didn't look away. He _wasn't_ gonna look away like a coward. But damn, did he feel like shit at this very moment.

"I'm sorry," he added as if to ease her pain. "I know that you-"

"It's not about what _I _want, Joseph." She sighed. "I believe you when you say you tried to work with Kaiba. That in itself..." She couldn't help but to sigh again- "is nice. It's nice," she trailed off, looking away. "Well, it's an achievement in itself," he continued thinking aloud more than anything else.

Wow. She sure had low expectations for him. It kind of stung to realize that his teacher was giving up on him so readily.

"I'll see what we can do about this," she said, standing up.

"Is it too late if I read it and give you something, uh... in a week?" Judging by the look in her eyes, Joey knew he might not earn redemption, but at least make up for his mistake. _Nice save, Wheeler. _"Can you write one page?"

"I can write two."

"Okay, then. That works." She turned away and walked to the door, showing Joey on his way out. "Have a nice weekend, Joseph," she said half-heartedly.

That farewell weighted like a rock on Joey's chest for the rest of the schoolday. The knowledge that he'd let her down.

Joey Wheeler was not a let-downer. But he'd been one, of late. Crumbling under the many responsibilities he felt he'd had to take over. But when you look at it closely, the whole walking out on Kaiba incident hadn't taken place for the same reasons. Heck, it wasn't his fault if the man wasn't able to communicate, if he was after things that Joey wasn't ready to... _share_ just yet... Not with him, at any rate.

For the rest of the say Joey wasn't able to resist scanning each classroom twice before taking a seat, just in case he'd see Kaiba sitting somewhere. Part of him would be relieved if Kaiba showed up; it would imply that he was already over this awkward episode of their non-relationship.

But part of him wouldn't know _what to do_ in Kaiba's presence. The thought of having to meet up face to face with the man gnawed at his insides. Fortunately, he wouldn't have to deal with the man personally ever again. Their sparring sessions hadn't resumed after their separation over the summer; Joey didn't and would never have to meet with Kaiba professionally and the chance that he'd be forced to work with Kaiba for the potential team assignments that could turn up in the few classes they had in common was beyond scarce.

Really, it's just as if Kaiba was out of his life.

Good riddance.

Good riddance?

Kaiba or not, (ex-)nemesis or not, Joey couldn't quite stomach the idea of parting with someone on such bad terms. Not that they weren't on good terms. Actually Joey had missed out on a chance of being on _very good_ terms with Kaiba. Right?

Anyway, Kaiba just hadn't come to school at all today, apparently. It wasn't clear why, and Joey wondered why he even cared. That wasn't any of his business.

.

At four PM Joey normally got pretty hungry, because he typically ate little (little is an understatement) for lunch and partly because his body somehow just seemed to _know_ that he was about to go through an eight hour shift plus one hour overtime today and wanted to bulk in advance. As a result, there was potentially no tangible food to be had until way after midnight. Just in time for a timely midnight fridge raid when his father wasn't home, or looking, or awake.

No, interestingly enough, Joey wasn't hungry today. Too much emotional shit going on.

He left the schoolgrounds in the company of a few acquaintances, doing some half-hearted small talk, catching up on everything that had been going in their lives as of late. These were the kids he'd been to grade school with, some of them mutual friends of Tristan's, some of them just neighbourhood kids in general. Tracey was among them; she was making plans to go clubbing later tonight and the idea was well received. Joey declined; he was much nerdier than he let on, although dancing his ass off would do him some good given the circumstances. The group thinned out as each member parted their own ways. Joey trotted to the hospital on his own, hands in his pockets.

It's only then that our blond happily discovered he had enough change to buy two or three things at the vending machines near the staff lounge tonight, during one of his breaks. He usually gulped something down during his first fifteen minute break, unable to hold until his 'official' half hour 'lunch' break at eight thirty at night. That schedule just didn't make sense, but like Stefano, his supervisor, said: 'a guy gotta what a guy's gotta do'.

So Joey dealt with it, and with a bunch of other things.

Namely, that the first thing he was told when he arrived at work, was that he was offered to take an additional shift this weekend. Someone else's shift. Gianni, the same guy who'd covered up for him when he fell asleep at Kaiba's place on his first visit, needed Joey to take his night-early morning shift on Sunday. Joey wasn't in a position to refuse anything to anyone, being both the youngest and the newest in the hierarchy of hospital janitors.

Yet actually, Joey was _delighted_ at first upon hearing the request from Stefano - that was a _legit_ reason for skipping on the fundraiser. Then again, the idea of a double-shift wasn't so tempting.

"Is he taking my evening shift on Saturday?" He asked Stefano, who had been asked to relay the message to Joey in Gianni's absence.

"No. Reason he's asking is that he wants to stay with his kids while his wife's out working. Bronchitis or something."

"Okay." Joey shrugged. "Yeah I guess I can take it." He signed the shift takeover form, then thought of something a second too late. "Wait, can we even do that? I thought the union... or something..." He had no idea what he was trying to say.

"Nah, the union can do a lot of things but not that. Hey, look at the bright side; you'll get paid more during that double shift, and 'cause you're young and don't make too much money yet you don't get none of it ripped off your taxes."

Joey wasn't quite versed well in money matters, but he believed Stefano. He had full faith in the guy, who was a childhood friend of Joey's father. Even though they weren't so close anymore due to lifestyle differences, mainly, Stefano had always taken over the role of 'godfather' to Joey, giving him a hand from time to time. Hence getting him this reasonably well-paid job. Joey used to go sleep on Stefano's couch whenever his father got hospitalized overnight, which had been somewhat frequent in the first years following the separation.

Yes, _separation_, not divorce; Elaine Wheeler was much to religious to come against the vows she'd made to her God and actually break their wedding oath. It didn't prevent her from seeing another man, though. Joey didn't know if they were fooling around yet and he was perfectly okay with not knowing.

Joey's first shift quart went rather quickly. The hunger teased him, came and went, partly thanks to the powerful, unappetizing stench of the powerful cleaning products he used in his line of work. But it was getting better every time; during the first months Joey couldn't eat a bit at all during 'lunch' break, he had to actually exit the building and breathe in the outside, city air before he could have a bite.

By the time his first fifteen minute break came, Joey had become reasonably hungry. He settled for an egg sandwich (no crust) and a candy bar, which he chose to eat in the staff room.

Every eligible conversation partner was outside on cigarette break or glued to the payphone. Quite frankly, Joey could use the company at that moment. He'd used all sorts of silly tricks to keep his mind off the last twenty four hours' events, talking to everyone and anyone he could. But he knew that wouldn't work for long; visiting hours would be over in an hour, patients would be put to bed, hospital staff would be thinning to the bare essentials, which meant down to a few people so busy they couldn't even afford giving Joey a nod or a hello.

He'd have to spend the rest of his shift alone with his thoughts on how he'd managed to let two people down in one single day.

_Joy_.

There was a stack of magazines Joey never touched; he didn't care for celebrity gossip or fashion tips or whatever else. But he rifled through the pile anyway with one hand, munching on his sandwich with the other. The company of semi-fictional people was better than the company of no people at all.

It wasn't actually all women's magazines. Well, not like the alternative was of any interest to him. Something about golf, something about travel, Food and Wine... and a few others on finance or business or whatever. Well, might as well check them all, just for fun. Keeps your mind wandering at least. And so, he made his mind up to go to the bottom of the pile, if only for the sake of going to the bottom of the pile. He nearly choked on some half chewed egg salad filling when he saw Kaiba's face doting the cover of Young Entrepreneur.

_**DOMINO IN THE PALM OF HIS HAND**_  
>NINETEEN YEAR OLD SETO KAIBA AT THE HEAD OF THE<br>FASTEST GROWING PLAYER IN DIGITAL ENTERTAINMENT

Joey looked for the print date, written out in tiny characters next to the magazine's price tag. It was a back issue, but a reasonably recent one. And it wasn't just a front page photo; there was a full section just on Kaiba and his so-called 'gaming empire'. Joey's eyes scanned the subtitles of the article over and over without really absorbing anything. He shut the magazine and put down his sandwich.

Then, not really knowing what to do of this, of having Kaiba show up in his life even in the unlikeliest moments, Joey pushed the magazine away.

He set out to finish his lunch in peace and put his feet on a chair, crossing his legs at the ankles. He put them down immediately when he remembered that's how he'd sat yesterday in Kaiba's living... _bed-_room... slash _office_, about exactly twenty hours ago.

The scene, the gloomy atmosphere of the Kaiba mansion felt so vivid still.

His sandwich was finished unceremoniously. Then the candy bar was consumed, bite by bite. Joey's eyes lingered on the Workplace Safety posters on the walls around him, on the passive aggressive notes on the micro-wave door asking people not to bring fish to work. Somehow, Joey's eyes always ended up darting in Kaiba's direction.

Well, in the direction of his million dollar face.

Joey had six minutes left before his shift was to resume. He felt neither hungry nor quite full. Reluctantly, he stood up, walked around the table, grabbed the magazine again and walked back to his seat. He began flipping pages again as a co-worker walked by.

"I always said you were the smart one," the middle aged lady said, fishing around in the fridge for her lunchbox.

"Well, you know what they say. Can't judge the book by its cover." He grinned, and the lady grinned back at him, then left.

She thought he'd been actually _reading_ the thing. For its content. Funny concept. If Joey didn't put himself through mandatory school readings, he certainly wasn't gonna put himself reading about _finance_ of all things, just for the sheer fun of it.

Joey grinned and nodded, then dove back into the... photo shoot that featured the new mystery in his life. One especially striking picture had Kaiba standing on some many story high balcony somewhere in Domino, arms crossed, proudly overseeing the financial center of the city. He looked like he owned the whole place, the whole city.

And most of all, he exuded confidence.

Which was not at all what Joey had witnessed from close upfront, this week, in the intimacy of the CEO's own lair. When had this photoshoot been taken? When had Kaiba made time in his undoubtedly tight schedule to be extensively interviewed and photographed?

Strange to say, but from having had so many fights with Kaiba over the years, to be so physically acquainted with him, in a way, Joey had grown to feel like he _knew_ the man. He'd gotten to know which insults he was more likely to latch out and when, he had developed a sixth sense of how to press the brunet's buttons...

Silly now how _little_ this actually meant. Joey knew nothing, _nothing_ about the man and his many lives. He'd been offered a glimpse into one of them, though. And he'd made no good use of it, of that occasion. But what did that even mean? Surely that's how Kaiba would think, 'to make the most out of every occasion', to maximize profit or whatever. He surely saw _fun_ as something to be optimized. Well, assuming he was even familiar with the word.

Joey looked at the clock. One minute to go. He tossed the magazine back in the pile, wiped his hands on the pants of his uniform, gave the glossy cover a last glance and exited the room.

.

Maybe Kaiba was angry. He was fully entitled to be angry. Yes. That was why he hadn't shown up to school today. That made sense.

That truth of life came to Joey as he was kneeling in the geriatrics ward, scrubbing crusty IV liquid the floor with the orange sponge.

Kaiba probably hadn't wanted anything with Joey _proper_. Heck, he could get anyone he wanted in this city if he wanted to. Joey had been one of these many potential... mates? Maybe Kaiba simply saw _every _human being a potential mate, coolly assessing their genetic baggage before agreeing to couple his DNA with theirs. But that didn't make sense; Joey was a guy, and if anything his genetic baggage was bound to suck. Well, his mother and father were alive and kicking, but damn, they weren't the healthiest people in the world - both mentally and physically.

Meh, Kaiba had much better than to care about Joey or even school. Why did he bother showing up anyway? And at nineteen?

Joey blanked out, set his mind on scrubbing off the stain in time for his half hour break. He didn't like it when he had to leave unfinished things on the side. It would only stay on his mind and he couldn't enjoy the much needed timeout from rainbow colored cleaning products and remnants of bodily fluids.

.

He felt idiotic when he found himself feeling a pang of anguish upon entering the staff room. The magazine wasn't there. Joey frantically searched the remaining scattered magazines.

Turned out it was there still, stashed under a few others that another employee had read and tossed negligently. Joey grabbed it and started reading the interview. It was eight pages long, minus two full page pictures and some graphs.

It was a remarkably un-informative read. Meaning it revealed nothing, zero, nada about Kaiba's life _as a human being_. Oh, you still got a lot on his business ethics, his corporate values and all that jazz. But there was no mention of his personal life, not even the generic, non-revealing 'favorite restaurant', nothing about pets, anecdotal childhood memories or family.

Well, that Seto Kaiba didn't want to address his troubled past, Joey could understand. He didn't know exactly in what circumstances Kaiba had been adopted, but it must suck to lose one family to begin with only to have them die on you a few years later. Did Kaiba miss his adoptive father? How did he manage with work, school and his younger brother to look after? It was understandable Kaiba didn't want to mention his current family - there were probably many kidnapping threats looming over little Mokuba.

Yet, Kaiba could use, if he wanted to, all of that negative press to his advantage. Seto Kaiba, the orphaned millionaire! The gifted heir to an imposing empire! The brilliant star who was determine to shine against all odds in a sky of... Joey ran out of metaphors.

And meanwhile, an improvised poet, part-time 'sanitation agent', supposedly full time high school slacker was reading a magazine in a hospital basement. And he didn't know what he wanted to do with his life.

The money was pretty good here and the people weren't bad, but Joey frankly couldn't see himself switching over to the full time schedule upon finishing high school, spending 40 hours a week indoors, his life regulated by his fifteen and half-hour breaks. He wanted something more out of life. He just wasn't sure what exactly... And he didn't know yet what he was capable of doing, what gift he had that he could give to society.

Joey sighed.

There was _one_ thing that came close to 'personal' about Seto Kaiba in the article, though. That brief section on his education. Kaiba hadn't been shy about that - yesterday night and with the press as well, it seemed. He'd agreed to have the interviewer ask him in detail about how many languages he was fluent in, what literature classics he'd read at what age (that wasn't a secret for Joey anymore), how he'd learned geometry reading straight from Euclid's original writings (and rhetoric straight from Aristotle, whoever that was) and how he could take apart, then put back together small engines like lawnmowers and the like. He could quote Foucault, Keynes as well as any of the Founding Fathers. He learned to pilot a Cessna at age fourteen. That was the last thing on the list of things Kaiba the illustrious had learned.

And it had taken place a few months before his adoptive father died.

But that wasn't written in the article. That was something Joey knew, for some reason. He couldn't remember when he'd learned about it. Maybe word of mouth. Kaiba would never have told him. Not intentionally, anyway.

It sort of made sense that Kaiba be so open and flashy, to some extent, about his education. He had a stake in looking like a good potential role model for the people behind his target audience's wallets. All kinds of people were after video games and how violent and how nocuous they were for today's youth; Kaiba was probably trying to off balance the negative press his line of business was getting with the positive image of a remarkably well learned young man who had earned more erudition than what the national education system could ever give him.

The only thing was, the article never specified where or how Kaiba earned that rigorous education. There was always the possibility that he'd taught himself all of this, but that would be a bit too extreme. Every child just wants to play and there should be no exception to that, not even the genius son of a weapon manufacturer.

There was no more to the story. Kaiba could pilot a cessna. And that was that. Now the prodigious youth was apparently too busy with manning his company and waisting his time at school to actually learn new (useful) stuff. Because really, now, the _wasting_ part - yes, wasting. That much was clear to Joey now. There was absolutely no learning to be had for Kaiba at Domino High, the city's largest public high school. It just didn't make sense that he still attend. If only Joey knew what the teacher meant when she'd told him Kaiba had much to learn still... Or something along those lines.

Exhausted from toying with so many riddles, and from having had to _care _about all these unanswered questions about the enigmatic young man, Joey shut the magazine and took a last, good look at Kaiba's face. As if it held answers, as if one could read it, just like tea leaves.

Then something struck Joey. Something very simple, in fact.

That face wasn't Kaiba's. Or at least, it wasn't really him. It was heavily airbrushed. Joey had seen the man from close enough to know. Under Seto's eyes, there should have been lines. And a dark shadow. There were more little red veins scurrying over his eyeballs. The ridge of his nose wasn't so straight. Joey smirked in pride over the artwork he'd played a central role in creating. Kaiba still exuded power and confidence, he still had the same elegant, high cheekbone and thin eyebrows, nicely defined lips and thick eyelashes... But he'd been glossed over. At only nineteen, he needed the assistance of restorative technology to appear younger.

Joey knew a lot more about Seto Kaiba than the world did.

That thought hadn't occurred to him until now.

Joey granted his mind full permission to wander anywhere it pleased for the rest of the shift. And that including near Kaiba. Near what could have happened between the... two of them. Then it skipped to how Joey disliked his own parents. How he still couldn't help but want them to play the actual part of 'mother' and 'father' at times. How he really wished the two girly blondes in 'those' magazines were guys. How maybe 'that guy' could be him at some point... And how badly he needed some release. Two days of abstinence was a long time for a seventeen year old male.

Only once freed from his mop and bucket did Joey realize that by embracing his obsession, he'd gone full circle and freed himself from it. He dashed out of the hospital's automatic doors and relished in the cool night air. It wouldn't be too late to join the gang at the club. But he was bound to pass out during his double shift if he did. Better act responsibly. Plus who the fuck was he going to dance with, girls? He was more likely to get so drunk and uninhibited he'd make out with random guys and be totally outed on like, Facebook or something. Not what he had in mind for himself.

So he headed home, hands in his pockets, ready to spend more quality time with his obsessions.

He'd actually spent little time thinking exclusively about Kaiba for the remainder of his shift. Well he was _now_, obviously, but it was more thinking about _thinking about_ Kaiba. It wasn't thinking about him _per se_.

Yeah, well, screw that. Now he wanted to think about him more. Why the heck not. Might as well get to the bottom of this.

Was Kaiba gay? Joey was a little more certain, everyday, where he _himself _stood on that spectrum, but it truly baffled him that... he should've seen it coming. Really. It wasn't all that _baffling_ at all that Kaiba might fancy other men.

What did that entail about all their little, medium, big fights?

The _irony _- two fruits engaging in repeated displays of testosterone. Together. Wasn't that funny? Wasn't that hilarious as fuck?

At any rate, Joey could never see himself attracted to those typically 'flamboyant' guys, complete with a pink dress shirt, interior design instincts, lisp and all. No now, not ever.

But yeah, he was pretty sure he was gay.

.

It was a relief to come home to an empty apartment. 'Alone' meant 'pulling one off in peace'.

Just what he needed to calm himself down.

After closing his bedroom door behind him, Joey lifted his mattress and plucked out what he regarded as 'inspiration' for the climax to come. He snuck his right hand under his armpit to warm it up. With the other, he hastily flipped through the worn out pages. That particular magazine was not so mainstream, it was straight stuff but there was equal focus on the guys and the girls, just so that it was male enough for Joey's tastes. However - and that was key - it was 'girl' enough so that his dad wouldn't suspect anything if he found his stash.

Joey quickly picked that one centerfold he indulged in whenever he didn't feel to closeted - that image with the two straight couples mingling. Those two four models' straightness was... questionable, to say the least, and that was the kind of ambiguity Joey relied on to get off. He sat down on the edge of the bed, twisting his torso a bit so he could see the double pager, and got unceremoniously down to business. He undid his pants one-handedly. Freed his member one-handedly. He removed his right hand, now decently warm, from his armpit.

He closed his eyes and gave a first stroke. It felt - it felt _amazing_. His skin was deviously sensitive. When Kaiba brushed by his thoughts again, Joey opened his eyes and cast a glance at the magazine. He noticed a shine between his thumb and his index; Joey's cock was glistening with precum already. He inhaled sharply. Focusing on the arousing image, Joey began working at more firm, serious strokes. Kaiba was threatening to invade his mind again; Joey's eyes were focused on the naked, tangled limbs sprawled out before him, but not really seeing them. He should really take care of this quickly.

But part of him wanted to relish on the novelty of the experience; he had never felt the compulsion to touch himself while thinking of an actual person. He wanted to play with it, experiment with it; he imagined Kaiba undoing his own pants, freeing his own cock as he crawled towards Joey. He was now engulfing Joey's member in his own mouth, bobbing his head in time with the rhythm of his own strokes. Somehow, the idea of Kaiba pleasuring himself for him was an incredible turn on. Kaiba would moan. He would relish in the taste of Joey's cock, in his smell. He would beg to be gagged, to feel the pressure of Joey's hand on his nape, forcing his head up and down, eliciting low grunts of pleasure from him as his watering mouth serviced Joey's throbbing cock.

Joey gave a long stroke, from the tip to the bottom and back again, feeling the soft skin sliding with ease over the hard shaft, his balls swaying up and down along the motion. Images of Kaiba's lips flooded his mind again, slowing down his own ministrations, waiting for Joey to tell him to come, suckling and rolling his tongue around the rock hard, uncovered head already glistening in saliva and precum. He saw himself coming in his mind's eye, Kaiba's tongue lapping at the creamy streams leaking from the tip. Joey sucked in a breath, feeling a brief vacuum in his groin before his own actual climax took him by surprise, his member pulsating against the palm of his hand.

He opened his eyes to the dim light of his nightstand, the stillness of the room punctuated by the beating of the blood rushing in his eardrums. He'd thought his mind would clear. He'd thought his temporary obsession would make way for inner peace. The erotic thought did desert him, but Joey found himself wanting to hold onto it. He immediately sensed guilt creeping over him for having given himself pleasure thinking of Kaiba.

As he felt the warm come on his fingers, Joey reminisced the forlorn silhouette of the kneeling man, leaving him in a vague state of dull, diffuse sadness.


	6. Day Five

It was a dreadful bus ride getting to that part of town, but it was worth it because the food was just _that_ good at the Mandarin Garden. In Joey's opinion it was by far the best all-you-can-eat place in Domino. It compensated for his mother's presence; today he was about to have brunch with her, and her 'friend from church'.

Joey was standing next to the lady he'd offered his seat to, and he himself clung to a worn out plastic loop that hung from a metal pole. He looked at the mini malls, then at the bus's scratched windows. He'd never quite lost the reflex of trying to identify the tags people left there late at night, just in case he might recognize one. It took him resolve to resist playing with his brand new shaving cut. It was itching, down on his neck, just where the hem of his sweater touched his skin. The bus came to his stop; a bunch of people were also heading for the mini-mall that hosted the Mandarin Garden. He waved the lady goodbye and got off.

Brr. He hugged himself. Today wasn't the warmest day.

Joey had hoped, when he got dressed this morning, that the weather would get slightly warmer, with, you know, the sunshine and all. But the wind had picked up quite a bit and with nothing more than a sweater thrown over the sacred polo his mother loved so much, Joey felt like the breeze went straight to his bones. He cut through the parking lot, jogging to the restaurant which had a bright yellow and red banner promoting its AMERICAN BRUNCH WEEKENDS 9AM TILL 3.

He pulled the sweater over his head as soon as he got inside, hoping the heating in the lobby would warm him up. Joey usually dressed pretty lightly even in winter, but the polo had really short sleeves that seemed to tighten around his biceps and maybe cut off his circulation. Joey got in line behind an elderly couple and, looping his sweater over one forearm, started prodding at his arms - had he gained muscle weight, or had the polo shrunk in the drier?

"Um, how many people?"

Joey was startled by the voice of the hostess, a girl about his age. A bit embarrassed, he gave her a sheepish grin. "Oh, I'm with people."

The girl looked down at her clipboard, then at him.

"Wheeler," he quipped. He could never remember what name her mother used for unofficial purposes.

The girl scanned the sheet. "Hm, nope."

"... Creighton?"

"Hm... Yes. Over there." She pointed one of the many gymnasium-sized dining rooms.

He flashed her a winsome smile and a warm 'thanks' that made her become a bit coy, then trod unhurriedly towards his destination, reminding himself that no matter how good the food looked and smelled, Joey _didn't _actually want to be here.

His mother hadn't ever used her boyfriend's last name before. Things looked like they were starting to change... Joey braced himself for some news he didn't want to hear over the course of this 'family brunch'. If his mother was taking the decision to remarry, her control-freak side would take over for the entire year preceding the date of the ceremony. Even worse, it would mean that she'd actually have to divorce her ex, and the last thing Joey needed right now was to act as a go-between / mediator / advisor for his parents. His father would simply _not _take it well and there would be no end to his whining and bitching. Yes, _bitching_.

Fortunately, Elaine Wheeler's religiosity made the whole scenario very unlikely.

A bit glum from these depressing scenarios, Joey had to force a smile when he finally got to the table.

"Hello mom."

The petite woman looked up, wiping the corner of her lips with a napkin before speaking up.

"You're late!" She exclaimed, surprised and accusing all at once.

Her 'friend', a beefy guy that had her ex's exact silhouette, twisted in his chair to look at Joey, but not all the way, so they didn't make eye contact.

"Hey there Jim." Then, to his mother: "Yeah, missed the first bus."

"Your father could have given you a lift," she muttered, not missing a beat.

Joey judged it best not to tell her the car had been sold three months ago to repay some debts. He set up to sit next to his mother, but she stood up and frowned, barring his way.

"What kind of manners are these," she said playfully, the creases on her forehead smoothing a bit. She toed up, grabbed her son by the shoulders and gave him the ritual peck on the cheek. "That's my boy." Joey couldn't stifle a chuckle; no matter how much he wanted to be upset at the little woman, he just couldn't when she acted this way.

"Mom, I'm seventeen now." He squirmed away from the 'loving' grasp.

"Oh, 'seventeen years old'," she mimicked. "You're still _a_ _boy_! Look at you, you can't even shave yet," she chided, pointing at the rash surrounding the shaving cut.

Joey touched the scrape on his neck by reflex and looked away. He was never quite sure how to handle his mother's mood shifts. "You guys didn't have to wait for me," he said, noticing their squeacky clean, empty plates and assorted cutlery. The ice had started to melt in their drinks; there were many water creases on the paper table cloth where the glasses had been laid down, and picked up, repetitively.

"_Of course_ we waited for you. So. Jimmy's going to wait here, while we go grab our food."

Joey unceremoniously dumped his sweater on the chair next to his mother's, pretending not to hear the 'tsk' she let out, most likely in protest at his lack of manners. He followed her to the serving area.

So it was 'Jimmy' now? Okay. There was a little gleam of pride in her eye but Joey was less than eager to ask his mother about her romantic endeavours. And he hoped she would would always stay out of his.

Joey went for the stir-fried broccoli first, despite his mother's frown. He _did_ like to eat hash browns, little sausages, scrambled eggs, biscuits' n' gravy and all that. Really, he _liked_ those. But he only had so many opportunities to go to Chinese buffet these days, and so the sight of general tao chicken and Singapore noodles was irresistible to him. Of course, he did get criticized by his mother for his 'unseemly picks' and told how he should just 'try and be normal' for once. Joey had to grit his teeth; had he not worn her stupid polo? Had he not been extra careful to shave - twice - _just so_ he could look preppy enough for her tastes? Wasn't that normal enough?

They had to wait for Jim to come back with his first serving, and Joey knew he wasn't allowed to touch his plate until everyone was served so that he could say grace. He looked around idly, hoping to deter any attempts at small talk his mother might fancy.

"Your father has such an irregular schedule. I never know when I can call," she started.

"Uh," Joey acquiesced.

"Do you know what he _did_ last time? Do you _know_?"

"I don't know," Joey said, as interested as ever.

"He picked up and then - and then he _hung up_ on me! Just like that! He didn't even let me get to the answering machine! I swear, the bastard got caller ID _just_ to spite me."

"Hm." This conversation couldn't possibly get more fun.

"Where are you all this time, anyway?" She placed a napkin on her lap. "You're never _there_ when I call! Don't you have any homework to do? Something? Do you even _sleep_ there?"

"Um, yeah. Yeah."

She studied him for a second, then resumed her monologue. "It's the arcade," she concluded, shaking her head disapprovingly. "The arcade. That's not a very good habit to develop at your age," she insisted, leaning closer and gripping his wrist to punctuate her words. Joey wanted to pull away but didn't.

When your teacher's hand feels nicer than your mother's, there's a problem.

"Yeah," he said again, not caring too much that it wasn't the most appropriate answer. Not the one she'd want to hear from him, anyway. He knew very well what she was alluding to with her 'arcade' sermon.

"It's just that I've been at a, uh, friend's place for a team project. This week. Yeah."

Joey wanted to kick himself. He'd managed to avoid thinking about Kaiba until now, but it was too late. Everything and anything Kaiba related came back to his mind with full force. He wasn't hearing what his mother's babble anymore. Just Kaiba, Kaiba, Kaiba. Thankfully Jim got back to the table with his own heap of greasy, salty but oh so tasty protein.

"Now we can do Grace," the woman announced like she was a Lady of the House from the Regency era.

Joey reluctantly held out his hands to his step-dad-_thing_ and mother. He then bowed his head and tried to figure out what eloquent thing he had to say about how grateful he felt for his general tao and fried rice.

But now words came. Only a shape, a face, a voice. _Kaiba_.

_Thank you God for... _not..._ making me a sad, pathetic guy who sleeps in his own office_. The mental image gave his heart a small squeeze. Joey might not ever be willing to trade his idiot parents for the lonely nights Kaiba must be having, everyday of his life, enshrouded in his self-aggrandizing loathing for the world around him.

"Today I thought _Jimmy_ could say Grace," his mother chimed in, disrupting Joey's unproductive thinking process.

Joey frowned. Wasn't Grace _his_ thing? This was - this was perhaps the _only_ moment in his teenage life, during which he felt there existed an actual, earnest filial bond between himself and his mother. Yes, that was when she respectfully drank in his words, lifted her head, pride glinting in her eye at the sight of her precious, pious son, then took a moment to smile at him before engaging her own meal. So Jimmy already had a head start. Joey had been too moody to notice.

The man's words were lost on Joey. That prayer was ridiculously long and uselessly wordy. _Get over yourself, this is just stuff we scooped on our plates._ Not that Joey was ungrateful; it's just that, in his opinion, Jim was overdoing it a bit.

Joey was losing his appetite.

When everyone parted hands, Joey's felt moist; he resisted the urge to wipe them on his pants.

"I'll be back," he said, and got up before his mother could have a say in the matter.

He went back to the serving stations. One of the kitchen workers was a girl Joey knew from grade school. They did a bit of chit chat, both more than happy to skip a bit on work or family duties (which felt more like 'work' to Joey in fact). The girl mock-complimented him on his 'preppy boy polo' before returning to her duties.

Joey found himself wanting to just leave the restaurant right here and there, rather than walking back to his mother's table.

He grabbed a hash brown on a new plate and slopped back to his table, unhurriedly.

"See? I've knocked some sense into you after all," said his mother in guise of welcome. Jim said nothing; he wasn't a talker. Or maybe he knew a budding argument when he saw one; and frankly, you needed that kind of sixth sense if you wanted to survive being around Elaine Wheeler a lot. "Do you want some of my bacon? Was there any left? It goes away so quickly."

"Um, no thanks, I'm not too hungry," Joey replied, pushing the Chinese plate on the vacant spot in front of him. "Damn, I forgot the ketchup." He was about to stand up but a firm hand on his arm kept him in his seat.

"Now. You're going to act your own age," his mother warned, her sharper tone meaning business. "We're eating. _Togethe_r."

Joey sighed.

"Oh will you," she sighed in turn, exasperated. "Have some of mine, there," she said, lifting up her plate so she could scrape some of the red condiment onto his.

He lifted an arm to prevent the transfer. "No, I'm fine, really." R_eally_. One thing he didn't want to risk was an indirect kiss with James Creighton. "I'll just have some of this," and before he could realize what he was doing, Joey was scraping some of his own sauce onto the single hashbrown - some sweet, technicolor orange, general tao sauce.

"For the love of - Joey, what are you _do_ing? Jimmy, say something!"

The man glanced at them both and wisely opted to 'mind his own business'.

Joey pushed back the plate, a bit hazy.

_She's got a point, though - what _am_ I doing? _

"What's gotten into you, Joseph?" She slammed her utensils on the table and lifted her hands in the air wordlessly.

_I jacked off thinking of a guy I used to hate … and I enjoyed it. _

_That's what. _

Joey sectioned a corner of the potato galette with his fork, knowing very well that _not_ using a knife would tick his mother even further. He stuck the thing in his mouth just to see how far he could get.

_What am I doing?_

Okay, pride had to play a role here. Joey chewed the thing with obvious effort. His mother finally looked away, but not without clicking her tongue in disapproval.

The teen gulped the bite down with iced water, well aware of his mother's not so subtle spying. _Knock it off, mom_. "I'm getting some juice."

He got up again and didn't turn when he heard the sound of cutlery banging on the table. _Again_.

When Joey got back from the juice fountains, Jim's seat was vacant. Oops. He'd probably chased the man away with his childish antics.

"I'm sorry Mom, it's just - I haven't gotten a lotta sleep lately and-"

"See? I told you; you shouldn't have taken that part time job. I told you and you wouldn't _lis_ten to me."

Joey brushed it off. "Um, where's Jim?"

"At Whitney's," she replied, motioning towards the giant drugstore across the parking lot.

"Oh."

Then Joey remembered about the empty antacid bottle in his father's cabinet. "Shit," he muttered to himself.

His mother gave him a slightly less reproachful look - one that was bordering on concern. "Why, did you wanna go? Do you need anything?"

"Yeah... Um, no," he amended carefully. "No, I'm all good. I'm all good."

"Joey..." She started more softly. "Joey, don't hide anything from your mother." Her gaze had softened.

"No really, that was just - I thought I needed something but I remembered I got some, so I'm good, really. Yeah. How's the bacon?"

His mother considered him for a second.

"You've never been a good liar. Like your sister," she said, her eyes flickering out the window.

_Great_. Just what he needed. To be reminded of his late baby sister's cute little, forever endearing flaws. Now he was trapped; if he didn't say he _did_ need something, she'd get upset. And if he _did_ say he needed to buy antacids and for whom, she'd get in a fit and vent about how irresponsible her low-life of an ex was to rely on his son to take care of him... And of course, Joey couldn't very well say he needed the antacids for himself; she'd freak out on how much too young he was to suffer such a scarring ailment.

And that would only cement her belief that the stress of a part-time job was too much for him to handle.

"Um... I need... Um... Band-aids."

"I can see that," she chuckled, looking at his fresh cut, and Joey let have her little laugh.

"Yeah."

"You should eat some more before we go. I told the bus boy not to take your plate away."

"Thanks, mom." He pulled the plate towards him, hoping that his hunger would return even if only to please his mom.

"They'd be charging us. Imagine? All that good food," she went on, and Joey's face fell a little.

Some people just don't change.

.

Jim gruffly declined the offer to 'go back in the store with us? We're going to get something for Joey'. He would wait in the car with a game of sudoku.

Mrs Wheeler had apparently been overwhelmed by a wave of (guilt induced) generosity, for it had suddenly become imperative that Joey be fully equipped with a shaving kit, band-aids, cotton swabs and ear plugs 'so that you can focus when you study'. The implication was that Mr Wheeler watched too much television, too loud. Well, it was indeed quite true that the man's couch potato days weren't a thing of the past. If anything, the habit had only worsened since the separation.

The mother and son pair had to switch over from basket to cart, because the woman decided Joey should stock up on value-pack amounts of TP of the finest quality available. Joey's meek refusals were met by his mother's insistence that _he_ be the only one to use it. Which was a bit ridiculous. What was he going to tell his dad, not to touch the thing? _You can't wipe your ass with that, dad, mom bought it for _me. Actually the man would be more than happy to indulge; if he knew the thing had been acquired with his ex-wife's money, which he believed to be rightfully his...

Joey winced at the mental image, blindly following his mother through the aisles. She stopped and looked left, then right, hesitating.

"You don't have cologne, do you," she risked, not doing a very good job at hiding her budding excitement.

"No... I can't wear it at school. People can be allergic," he explained, regretting more every passing second to have agreed to let his mother buy him toiletries.

She closed in on him. "But when you're going to meet a girl..."

He frowned. "No, really. No perfume. Thanks anyway," he said firmly.

She pouted - _pouted!_ - and her talking hands dropped to her sides. "Well, then." She led him to the aisles that had the stuff you can actually eat. Joey found himself craving a Red Bull.

"I know what you're thinking," the woman said. "But you know those aren't good for your health."

"I know."

"But... you're working so hard." And just like that, she grabbed a can and placed it in the cart under Joey's astonished eyes. "On one condition."

"What's the condition?"

She pointed a row of bottles on the shelf, reaching for some multi-vitamins. "These," she said.

But Joey wasn't paying attention to the fine print on the label or the benefits of fruit flavored dietary supplements.

The antacids his dad normally used were right there before his nose, on the upper shelf, so far yet so close. And all Joey could do was eye them longingly.

.

The unplanned car ride back to the apartment Joey shared with his dad was punctuated by his mother's 'I can't look' and 'look at this, oh dear, just look at this, what are there people doing to themselves' as they drove through the less fortunate parts of her former neighbourhood, and their colorful inhabitants. Easy for her to say now that she'd shacked up with a middle-class, bungalow-owning resident of one of Domino's decent suburbs.

"I'm going to check the tires," she said as soon as the car stopped in front of their destination. There was a logic behind that action; there wasn't a day where some jerk or other hadn't smashed a beer bottle on the pavement. There were nails and pieces of scrap metal, too - God knew where _those_ came from. It's like the poor neighborhoods didn't need to be taken care of, that it was okay to litter.

Joey carried his bulky package to the front door of his building, buzzing with his one empty hand, holding the bag on a lifted knee.

He waited patiently for his dad to wake up - or carry himself to the door, or whatnot.

"What's _she_ doing here," came his dad's voice through coarse reception.

"It's just me, I'm droppin' something off."

A pause.

"She's not coming in."

"She _isn't_ comin' in, dad. Open up."

There was a longer pause.

Then the obnoxious buzzer rang, letting Joey in.

Three flights of stairs later he was at the door, which had been opened in advance for him. His dad was peering at the new car in the street through his dusty blinds. He didn't turn to his son when he walked in.

"Some fuckin' dick with a Volvo," the older muttered to no one and the world at once.

Joey hastened to his bedroom. He heard the metallic click of the living room blinds popping back in place.

"What's that?"

"Just some stuff," Joey said evasively.

"She think I'm broke? She think I need her shit? What the fuck _is_ that?"

"I dunno, dad, it's just... one of those things, yanno."

"Tell her I don't need her shit," the man barked. "Get that out. Tell her I don't need her shit."

Joey shifted his weight, trying to think fast on his feet. No way was he taking everything back to the car. "Look dad, it's just stuff. It doesn't matter." When the man didn't reply, Joey went on more confidently. "I'll just leave it there, okay?" It was more of a rhetoric 'okay'. Joey was past the age of asking his father permission. He was merely letting the man thinking he was still in charge, just to stay out of trouble. Without wasting more time he dumped the bagful of supplies on his bed and came back to the living room, stopping by the doorframe.

His father had gone back to peeping at his ex-wife again, muttering swear words between his teeth.

"I'm working a double shift tonight. Not coming back at midnight." Then, when his father didn't react: "Okay?" That wasn't a rhetoric 'okay'. It was a 'can you take care of yourself' okay.

The man grunted. Joey suddenly remembering that he would have to tell his mom about his double-shift, too. And that he wasn't going to do the fundraiser after all. She wouldn't be too happy about that.

"Uh, so I'll get some eggs on my way back and-" Joey started walking towards the fridge for a quick check, but the man waved a dismissive hand at him, stopping the youth in his tracks.

"Never mind that." The father's voice had grown slightly less aggressive. "I can take care of that." He sounded slightly ticked.

Joey stared at his shoes for a moment, hating that he knew - they _both_ knew - that his father was probably _not_ going to keep his word.

"Well, see ya."

Waiting for a reply was futile. Joey jogged down the hallways and stairs, aware he'd already made Jim wait too long. The longer the wait the more his mom would get upset with him not doing the something-o-thon tomorrow.

He doubled back when he remembered about the Red Bull. The door to the apartment hadn't been closed. Joey saw his father standing up by the sink, apparently lost in thought.

.

Joey got to work an hour early. He didn't mind; he knew there was plenty of reading waiting for him in the staff room. _Might as well have brought some homework_, he thought.

Meh. He didn't give a flying fuck about school right now. He wished he'd gotten to ride his wave of motivation a little longer, though. It felt kind of good to be a good student.

His parents just always made everything so depressing.

For some reason, reading about local business ventures was much more fun than reviewing high school math. Maybe because it wasn't being forced down his throat; Joey was enjoying it precisely because he was deciding to read it.

He didn't manage to focus, though, to get in the zone like last time. Four o'clock was coming and the more regular, day time staff was starting to leave - and Joey wasn't one to turn down small talk. Especially from mature women praising his intellectual pursuits. Funny how he looked like the smart guy, now that he was reading about business and politics. Well, _seen_ reading, for starters.

Joey put the magazines away and stashed his frozen dinners in the mini-fridge. He changed into his uniform and took off to his own ward, his thoughts slowly drifting back to Kaiba. And to that god-damned essay. Not the new one he promised his teacher - damn it, now he had to take care of that, too - but no, the one he'd read out loud to Kaiba. The one Kaiba had perfectly memorized. A chill ran down his spine. Kaiba had probably had to type the rest of the essay himself. With that quirky, unruly finger of his. Kaiba couldn't possibly have gotten much sleep last night. Was that why he stayed off school grounds, today?

Maybe it wasn't about hate, after all. Maybe Kaiba had simply slept in, rewarding himself with not having to attend the one social institution he disliked so intensely. Why had Kaiba gone out of his way to pretend the two of them had indeed worked as a team? He had no incentive to. Joey still couldn't make sense of it. What he was coming to terms with, though, was the possibility of Kaiba being gay.

Joey actually wouldn't mind travelling back in time and trying to react differently, just for kicks. Just to see what would've happened. Surely Kaiba's filthy mouth could be put to good use.

.

Guzzling his energy drink had been a bad idea. It was like all his blood was being redirected to his penis. He'd never had such a massive erection at two in the morning. And really, popping a boner in the vincinity of dying people was just peachy. Not to mention appropriate.

Because the thing was - he wasn't actually horny. It was just this weird, random, mechanical half-boner, like he was constantly half mast, not big enough to tent his overalls like earlier, but just big enough that there was friction. It was more of an annoyance than anything at this point, but it was bound to become a problem at some point. He dealt with it for now. He was almost done with the hallways, but at some point he'd have to enter patients' rooms and that would just be awkward.

Kaiba-groping-your-knee-with-a-twitching-finger awkward.

So during his break Joey went into the nearest bathroom, locked himself in a stall and unzipped his pants.

If he pulled one off, he might just earn peace for a little while.

He'd never dared going solo at work. Too impractical. Too weird.

But this was an emergency. Drastic measures were needed.

He grabbed his dick but his hand wasn't warm enough; he didn't know if he wanted to sit down or stand up or... Lean on a wall... with his hand? His forehead? The tiles were too cold.

His mind took a shortcut straight to Kaiba's mouth. No mental foreplay, only some good old fashioned, disembodied mouth fucking. And oh, it was so much more arousing than the washed up porno images he used to jack off to. Rather than a slow build up, the pleasure had surged to his loins.

Joey couldn't even see Kaiba's body in his mind's eye. Just his thin, pink lips around his member, and a slight inward crease in his cheeks. Somehow, something didn't match up. There was a glitch somewhere. But Joey had gotten noticeably hornier when the idea of sexing an imaginary Kaiba crossed his mind. No, not an _imaginary_ Kaiba. If he was going to be honest with himself there- yesterday-

He thought it would've been hot if he'd let Kaiba go down on him right then and there, instead of standing up and calling everything off. Just to know that the all powerful Seto Kaiba - not just the man who towered above all Domino, but also the one who'd brought him down all these years - that the all powerful Seto Kaiba willingly take him all in was a confirmed turn on.

Joey winced, debating the ethics of his fantasies while trying to nurture his arousal, which was of course futile.

What did it matter? Who he thought about, whether or not it was right? No one would know.

No one _cared_.

Maybe Yugi and Tristan would care if they knew. Heck, Tris' would be flat out freaked out. Yugi... Well considering he was gay himself... Would that change anything? What if Yugi also fancy Kaiba? Well, maybe not.

Joey had pretty much lost his boner by now. And the brief wave of lust he wished, again, he could've clung onto.

.

Joey's heart was bathing in a dull but strangely bearable ache when morning actually came.

He decided to stand idly by a window to watch the sun rise. Not that he could see the actual sun, but the gradual paling of the sky's blue gradients felt oddly comforting to him. Like it was a sign he was undergoing some kind of change. Something major, something important that was about to happen or maybe, rather, that had begun to take place around him. Inside of him.

Outside a few strategically placed windows started reflecting the sun, sending blinding specks of light his way. He squinted at first then averted his gaze; the trees' baby green leaves fluttered lightly in a wind he couldn't feel. He forced his eyelid wide open and let the light trickle into him; soon his vision was shrouded by a veil of yellow and orange that tinted everything around him.

He closed his eyes.

.

Joey was outside barely five minutes past the end of his shift, stretching his arms, relishing in the chill of the early Sunday morning breeze. He hoped it would get the stench of cleaning products out of his hair, skin, breath. His feet took him to the bus stop area. Streets were pretty empty. The city felt peaceful like this, irradiated by the sunshine, barely tainted by the sound and smoke and bustle of machines and human beings. Joey wasn't sure how he felt like spending the rest of his day.

There was always the cancer fundraiser. His mom had been surprisingly okay with him calling off; understanding, almost. He'd win major brownie points in her book if he showed up right now. Plus he was all pumped up, jittery and hyper awake from all the taurine in his blood.

Actually he also felt a bit dizzy in a way. Better try and lay low a few hours despite his urge to parcour through downtown Domino.

So he had plenty of options. But. Tristan was supposed to volunteer all day. The game shop wouldn't open until ten.

Well the _arcade_ was always open... But his mother did have a point; it was an easy segue for gambling and the thought of falling in his father's footsteps frightened him a little. Plus he was working so hard for the money - it would suck to spend it all on games, especially if he were to play alone.

There was homework to be done, but he had a hunch he wouldn't be able to focus much on anything that didn't involve moving. Plus he still - he still didn't own the friggin' book and bookstores would be pretty much closed all day.

A lone, early bird bus came into view, halting at the traffic light preceding the bus stop. It was the bus that led to the posh area of Domino, on the fringe of which Kaiba lived. What if... What if he borrowed the book from Kaiba?

Yeah!

He could drop in, say hi, maybe say sorry, then borrow the book and leave. Yep, an apology was probably in order. Just to, you know, make it clear that, um, there aren't any hard feeling or, erm...

The bus stopped for him. Joey hopped in on a whim, a spring in his step and a newfound flutter in his heart.

.

The flutter had flown away and the spring melted into a puddle of '_why just WHY did I think this was a good idea_' when Joey got off the bus.

He immediately wished he hadn't; he wished he'd stayed on board and gone back downtown...

Somehow it'd feel just like those times he'd walked out on Kaiba. Exactly the same. Running away.

It wasn't too late to turn back, still. He was a good ten blocks away from the actual entrance to the gate of the KC estate. He could jog back to another bus stop, taking in the beauty of the two garage houses around him, the cropped lilac trees and little stone pathways, the marble bird baths and the hibernating rose bushes. He'd never seen this neighbourhood up close; he'd always come here at night and never actually seen the wealth and also beauty concentrated in this part of the city.

Normally, he'd be throwing up a little in his mouth, thinking of how many people these house owners had had to exploit in order to gather all that money. But today, somehow, Joey felt pretty compassionate about the world and was willing to give even the worst assholes some slack. Today he was ready to give all these rich pricks a figurative chance, to give them the benefit of the doubt and to imagine that yeah, maybe they'd gone through all kinds of hell too, before they got there, maybe there were violent husbands and adopted kids in these three story mansions.

He jogged _towards_ the Kaiba estate instead.

It would be actually interesting to see it in daylight. Maybe it wouldn't be so glum, so macabre as it was, to him, on his first visit.

Doubt resurfaced when he reached the gate. He didn't want to look up at the security camera just yet. What.. What was _Kaiba_ going to _think_? There weren't any guards at the gate. It _still_ wasn't too late to head back...!

Kaiba wouldn't know - Joey shook his head. Yes, Kaiba _would_ learn about it, one way or another. He'd look at the footage of his security cameras and see Joey's disheveled silhouette awkwardly standing at his doorstep. Then maybe use that to taunt Joey at school. Or even blackmail him. Well, probably not. Maybe Kaiba would never come back to school at all! Maybe their paths wouldn't cross again for a long while, and then a few years later they'd meet again in unexpected circumstances, and Kaiba would be his old, usual hardened self and give Joey hell for having played him. Joey would have missed the chance to be on good terms with Kaiba...

"This is private property," a male voice said from the intercom.

Joey looked up at the camera. "I'm here to see Kaiba," he blurted out before he could think of anything else to say. "Erm, Seto Kaiba. Please," he slipped before looking down at his feet again.

"Name?"

"Joseph Wheeler." He thought they'd have him on file or something since last time.

There was a wait. It _still _wasn't too late to leave...! Not like the security guards would be unhappy _not _to have to walk all the way to the gate from the distant manor to escort him back in.

But Joey's feet were cemented to the cobbled stone path before his feet.

Gosh, what was he _thinking_? What was he going to tell Kaiba? '_Oh hey, um, sorry you're gay, I'm gay too but you sort of took me by surprise last time_' or something. Whatever that meant. Joey knew he couldn't just pretend he was here to borrow a stupid book. He couldn't believe his brain had fallen for that scenario. _Oh yep, that sounds legit, go right ahead, Joey, Kaiba'll fall for it_. _He is not gonna be pissed whatsoever to see you at his doorstep on a Sunday morning. _

"Someone's coming to escort you."

"Huh, okay, thanks."

Joey wasn't even sure they'd heard him. Like they would care about his reply, anyway.

He looked at the grassy expanse through the bars of the gate. It was still cropped like a golf course, and maddeningly empty. He saw a dot in the sky, more like a colored heap of something, above the mansion. It was hard to judge the distance because it was so high in the sky, so far out and tiny. It might just me a bird but it seemed too big and wasn't moving a whole lot.

Joey rolled the sleeves of his sweater, then remembered how it made them wrinkle in an ugly way (and that was his only clean sweater, so he couldn't afford to ruin it). He unrolled them right away. He ran his fingers through his hair to try and make it look okay, patting it gently until he didn't feel rebel bangs, then realized he'd flattened them out too much and ruffled his hair again to give it volume.

He'd repeated the whole process at least four times by the time a guard arrived.

They exchanged formal greetings before setting off to Kaiba's house.

In the end Joey couldn't resist trying to do small talk with the bulky man.

"It's a bit chilly, eh."

He'd expected the man to grunt or plainly ignore him.

"It is. Windy."

Joey was a bit stumped at having been acknowledged by the man.

Then a strange thought crossed his mind.

"I'm thinking just now... How come you guys never do me a pat down? Or something like that? You don't think I'm suspicious, showing up randomly, just like that, at nine in the morning?"

The man rose an eyebrow. "Should I be...?"

"No! No."

They were approaching the manor. The man's strides slowed down a little.

"Your file is clear. You're not perceived as a threat. I can tell you that much."

The word 'threat' ran icily through Joey's veins. "Well that's good to know," he said flatly.

The man let Joey's sarcasm slide. "But to answer your question, yes, we do have a policy of patting down everyone who enters these gates." He glanced at Joey's pants.

"Okay." Joey wouldn't even mind. He'd had his fair share of pat downs in his life. He knew exactly when to raise his arms and at what height and in what order he should empty his many pockets... These kinds of procedures were pretty universal.

They reached the imposing wooden doors of the KC mansion, and Joey stepped back to take it all in. Gosh, it did look gorgeous in daylight. The carved doorframe was sober but there was obviously a lot of skill involved. Even the metal handles looked too nice to be touched. The door was opened for them by a woman he could now call by her first name.

"Hey Clarissa."

Both staff showed surprise at the familiarity and perhaps, the genuine warmth in Joey's voice.

"Hello again, Joseph."

The suit retreated to wherever. Clarissa was holding a - was that silver? - platter with little sweets on it. Well he assumed those were supposed to be edible; they, too, looked too nice to be consumed, like little pastel colored toys, or painted porcelain.

"Nah, I'm good. You can call me Joey if you want," he said as his stomach growled.

The woman gave a light hearted laugh. "What was I thinking! You haven't had breakfast yet, have you."

"No..." He gave her a dubious glance. "Was it... were you expecting me or something?" His brows knit a bit further.

"No, no, these are simply little treats I keep ready for guests. Come on in, I'll make you something."

No, that felt wrong... She was being way too... _nice_ to him.

"Wait, no, I, I'm just here to pick up something. Pick something up."

"Oh, are you?" She asked, not looking like she was taking him too seriously. "Right now Kaiba happens to be free. It'd be a shame not to stay a little longer."

This was getting too odd for his tastes. Then, a realization. "Does he know I'm here?" Joey asked, not as smoothly as liked.

She looked a little disconcerted. "Well, I was under the assumption he'd simply forgotten to tell me about it. Does _he_ know?" There might have been a tinge of mischief in her eyes, but then again, Joey didn't exactly know her, so he couldn't be sure.

"That's what I'm asking!" Joey replied, way more needily than he'd like. "I mean - sorry, I didn't mean to sound impatient. It's just that..." He sighed, hated how rehearsed his new favorite excuse for everything excuse sounded. "I haven't gotten too much sleep lately, you see."

She switched the tray to her other hand, giving Joey a pensive look over. "I'm sure he'll be happy to see you. Just come; I'll make you a fruit plate."

Joey's stomach couldn't decline the offer.

.

They got to the kitchen area too fast. Joey could barely register the artfully painted ceilings, carved furniture, antique chandeliers they walked past. This part of the Kaiba home was just as _awesome_ as what he'd previously seen. Except of course Kaiba's office, which was pretty desolate and just... _sad_ in comparison. He hoped Kaiba spent a lot of time in these gorgeous rooms, but the little voice in Joey's head knew he probably didn't. It'd do him, good though. What a waste.

"You can still have meringues if you'd like," Clarissa said, drawing him from his reverie. Joey had devoured - as politely as a starved teenage boy could - the artfully arranged mangoes, cherries, strawberries, pineapple and kiwi slices laid out before him on a porcelain serving plate.

"Oh, um, I'm okay." He didn't actually know what a 'muh-ring' was. "I've never had mango for breakfast, that was pretty tasty."

Clarissa mentioned something about vitamins. He couldn't really focus on what she was saying, and he didn't mind. He also didn't mind that she wasn't taking him straight to Kaiba and didn't mind, either, not knowing where he was or where he was doing. Or what he was doing here. He was just feeling good.

It was strange. Yeah, strange. Being at Kaiba's place without being _near _Kaiba. The maid was so nice to him... He wished his mother could be more like her. They should meet up or something.

"So where's Kaiba?" Joey asked, because he'd have to at some point.

"He's outside with his brother."

"Mokuba?"

"Yes."

She didn't ask how or why he knew his name.

"I guess I better go see him right away, then. He'd be pretty pissed if he knew I'd been helping myself to his food without his permission."

"Whatever are you saying!" She waved a hand in the air. "He'll be happy to see you. It'll be a nice surprise," she added empathically.

_Erm, no. I don't think so_.

She looked so happy, though. He didn't want to burst her bubble. It was still jarring, to him, how … _motherly_ she was when talking about her employer. And how Joey was the target of these sort of confessions. It didn't make sense - Kaiba wouldn't hire someone so willing to talk about him to whoever happened to walk by his home, which was, now that he thought about it, way too easy to get in.

"Do you want more?" He knew from looking at her face that this wasn't a 'polite' offer; she looked as if though she'd gladly cook a whole pot of irish stew if it could make Joey happy.

"No, I better get to Kaiba," he said with just the right amount of finality, so that he wouldn't impolite to her, yet making it clear he meant what he said.

"Alright, then. Follow me."

They passed a luxurious living room and a number of silent, closed doors on the way to 'outside'.

And then they reached a vast, functional room that was well lit despite its northern orientation. The many windows gave to empty land, the same landscape he'd seen from Kaiba's bedroom window. So did that room, too, face north? Why on earth would he do that, when that building had to have more rooms than the high school he attended? Couldn't he pick a different spot to sleep, work and basically live? Kaiba and someone else - Mokuba presumably - were standing, apparently still, far away in the middle of the field.

"I'll let you walk up to them."

"Alone?"

"Why, yes. Wouldn't it seem a bit strange if I came along?"

"Oh, yeah. Right." He scratched the back of his head.

"What do I say- like, can I say you let me in, or... Wait, was it _you_ who let me in?" Joey hadn't even thought of asking until now.

She nodded, and ushered him outside.

.

Joey exited the mansion, but stayed in the shade for a little while. Just to take in his surroundings. He recognized the colored spot in the sky to be, in fact, a kite. A kite!

A kite maneuvered by the shortest of two silhouettes standing in the distance. I wasn't hard to tell which one was which. Kaiba was the one kneeling, dressed entirely in black. Mokuba was the one standing, wearing noticeably brighter colors.

Kaiba was flying a kite with his little brother on a Sunday morning. Joey's heart squeezed a little. It was such a strange thing for Kaiba to be doing, so out of character, he'd guess...

Joey was only a few feet away from the house. Surely he was being watched at the moment, spied upon for any hints of suspicious behavior. He could feel Clarissa's gaze on his nape. _Alright, I'm going!_ He walked out of the cool, misty grass into the sunlight, which warmed him up a little.

The kite had an odd shape, like it wasn't just the flat, diamond model he'd traditionally seen in books. Heck, he'd never even flown a kite himself. It looked like a lot of fun, actually.

Mokuba was the one flying the kite. Seto looked like he was helping him, kneeling by his side. Joey started to hear some of Mokuba's excited, high pitched cries as the kite began circling the sky in ever wider motions. Joey was getting dangerously close to them. And they still weren't noticing his presence.

_Because they're completely infatuated with one another_.

Not in the romantic sense. Just in the normal, 'I have someone that I love in my life' type of infatuation. Kaiba was keeping close to Mokuba, an arm around his shoulders, sometimes his waist to keep him from flying off when a strong gust of wind made it harder for the boy to man the kite on his own.

Then Joey noticed something. Kaiba wasn't looking up. Which was strange, because that's the whole point of doing this; they weren't putting on a show, they were doing this for themselves. Kaiba's eyes were riveted on his little brother.

_Look up, you moron. Look at the kite_. _Look!_

Joey grit his teeth. He felt the urge to just run the few remaining hundred feet separating them, grab Kaiba's head and force him to look at the miracle that was up in the sky. But his eyes were glued to Mokuba. He was holding the boy so naturally, one knee on the ground, one knee in the air. That must've been uncomfortable a position to keep. Yet Joey hadn't seen Kaiba move or shift or switch knees since he'd started walking towards them. Joey was now a few meters away from them. He'd have to come up with something to say and _fast_ before they noticed him.

Kaiba ruffled a hand in Mokuba's messy black hair, earning a meek protest from the child. That didn't deter Seto from trying to be affectionate, though; he immediately brought Mokuba closer to him, kissing his hair lightly, or at least nuzzling his hair.

Joey was shocked. No, rather, he felt a pleasant warmth - one that was completely new and foreign - shoot through his chest.

He took a few steps further, opening his mouth to make his presence known. He was five, maybe six feet away from the man.

Mokuba let out a gleeful cry and Kaiba laughed along, cajoling his little brother some more.

Joey had never heard Kaiba laugh.

He kicked some weed with the tip of his foot.

"Um, hey... Hey guys."

Kaiba first glanced at him and then - and then he abruptly craned his neck to look at the intruder; for a split second Joey could read on his features a look of perfectly unguarded, sheer surprise. Joey wanted to wave his hand as if to greet him, sheepish grin and everything, but the CEO gave him a glare so swift, so hostile, so _venomous_ it nearly choked Joey and stopped his heart from beating.


	7. Day Six

The kite soared, unperturbed by the emotional woes of the mortals below.

There passed on Kaiba's hardened features a stillness that gave his eyes a glossy finish - as if though he was looking for something inside him - and that gave Joey hope. But then nothing.

"Good morning."

Kaiba's voice had been disappointingly flat, and then again Joey wasn't sure if he had been lip reading, because the wind had whistled in his ear at the same time. He wished he'd brought his hoodie instead of his preppy, good-for-nothing sweater. "Good morning," he echoed flatly.

Kaiba stared, and Joey waited for the rest, almost expecting to be roasted like he rightfully deserved, in his opinion anyway.

Nothing came. No 'Wheeler'. No 'Joseph'. Not even a '_mutt_'.

A timid cloud cast a passing shade on the trio. More wind blew. Joey hugged himself. Kaiba didn't flinch. Then he stood up and turned away from Joey like he was done with him.

Joey felt a chill run down his spine, but this time the wind wasn't the culprit.

Then Mokuba turned his head enough so that he caught sight of Joey.

Like brother, like son, the one Kaiba that could still allow himself to be carefree also welcomed the visitor with sheer surprise, but one that turned into a kind of honest glee that frankly, was just the balm Joey needed on his heart right now.

Mokuba's eyes darted from Joey's to the kite, then to his brother's eyes. He opened his mouth to say 'hello' or 'hi', maybe, but he censored himself and nothing came out. _There's no harm in not wanting to upset your brother, buddy_.

Joey smiled uneasily as he waved back, mouthing some friendly greeting, echoing the kid's mutism. He looked at Kaiba's nape and jagged shoulder blades and then back at the mansion and back at the brotherly pair.

The wind caught in his ear and he didn't get what Kaiba told his brother but he could tell it wasn't permission to cuddle again. Joey looked up at the swaying kite, then back down at Mokuba who was now relinquishing control of the reel, toeing up and cupping his hands near Seto's ear. Joey watched Kaiba give him an all too brief glance before shaking his head lightly at his brother, whose whispered reply was lost to Joey.

Finally Kaiba took a few steps away further into the terrain, maneuvering the kite downwards. Joey watched Kaiba walk to the landing site, rolling the cord around his forearm.

Mokuba risked a step closer to Joey, alternating between anxious glances in his brother's direction and curious ones towards Joey. He jerkily waved at the newcomer again.

"Hey Mokie. What's up."

_Your toes sure look interesting_, Joey thought. Then: "Do you guys fly kites a lot?"

Mokuba spread his fingers out and sent his hand wavering, as if to mean, 'sort of' or 'mentioning kites is only going to get you so far'. Joey chuckled. Mokuba hadn't been shy the last time he'd seen him, or the times before. Then again, he hadn't seemed so tall, so spindly, either. It's crazy how fast kids can grow when you lose sight of them. "... You remember me, right?"

The boy nodded eagerly, then made an uninterpretable face, opening his mouth and not quite getting the words to come out.

Joey saw Kaiba heading back towards them, holding the kite by its spine. The blond balled his fists, expecting Kaiba to spitefully remind him how much of a second class citizen the mutt was. But Kaiba walked past him without sparing so much as a _glance _in Joey's direction.

"I – I interrupted something, didn't I," Joey blurted out dumbly like a schoolgirl handing an axe to a serial killer.

Kaiba still didn't react. Joey's stomach clenched. He hadn't expected that.

Mokuba gave Joey one last rueful glance before jogging up to his brother, not quite walking behind him nor at his side. Joey watched the pair walk back to the mansion. Not once did Mokuba close the distance between himself and his only living relative.

Joey cursed at his eight o'clock self. Coming here had been a most _excellent _idea.

No one batted an eye when he finally followed the brothers inside the mansion, sliding the tall patio doors shut in silence. The Kaibas were in the functional lobby along with a few people Joey judged were employees. The kite was leaning on the wall. Someone was holding another of those silver trays full of fat free, organic whatnots for the masters of the house to snack on.

Kaiba was making small talk with an employee. The young woman returned his sleek, gesture punctuated sentences with eager nods and prompt, monosyllabic replies. She didn't look like a housekeeping staff, with her simple glass frames, functional ponytail, clean black sneakers and smart jeans whose back pockets were full of wires and connectors and something that looked like the protruding handles of a pair of pliers.

Someone else walked through the room, then averted their step, darting for the kite. Kaiba lifted a brisk hand in dismissal, all the while maintaining eye contact with the female technician. Mokuba was sitting by himself on a wooden bench near the kite, munching idly on a banana, a discarded wrapper for sole companion.

Joey knew he didn't fit in this scene, and wanted nothing more than leave without a sound.

But when the CEO began walking out of the room, parting ways with the young woman, Joey's stomach clenched.

"Hey," he called out. _You saw me. I _know_ you saw me. _

Kaiba seemed to pause for a split second but walked 'round the corner anyway. Ignoring what few precepts of politeness he was ready to put in application inside Kaiba's mansion, Joey dashed after the man, muddy shoes on the carpet and all. When Joey caught sight of Kaiba again he had brought a smart phone to his ear.

Kaiba's silhouette seemed even frailer like this, framed as it was between the tall, narrow walls of the hallway.

"_Hey_," Joey cried out again, not caring for the needy edge of his request. "I wanna _talk _to you." By now he'd gladly welcome any insult Kaiba had in store for him, because these familiar attacks on his ego were so much better than that hollow feeling that had taken nest inside his chest when he'd been ignored a few minutes earlier.

Kaiba stopped in his tracks.

_Yes._

It wasn't the most diplomatic way to initiate an apology, but maybe Kaiba just didn't speak the language of humility, so Joey had to resort to any strategy he could to grab his attention.

Kaiba swung around and gave Joey an indifferent look over, then blinked and looked away as if someone had picked up at the other end of the line. "Yes-"

Joey opened his mouth to speak but the timing wasn't right. He couldn't just blurt out '_I'm sorry'_ in the middle of a potentially important conversation, when Kaiba's mind obviously was elsewhere, in the land of shareholders and third quarters and research and development. "I'm on my way." Kaiba looked at Joey again, then broke eye contact with him as if he'd just noticed a stain on the carpet and made a mental note to have it disinfected.

Then Kaiba was on the other side of a door, and out of Joey's eyesight.

He hadn't looked back.

_Fuck_.

Something stung inside his throat and he felt the urge to reach and scratch the sore shaving cut on his neck.

Apparently he wasn't needed anymore in here. The curious case of Seto Kaiba was closed.

That feeling of freedom should be coming down on him any second now.

Then his elbow was lightly knocked off.

"Pardon me." The maid, an older lady, bowed impersonally and walked past him, a high pile of clean linens in her arms.

She disappeared into one of the doors, apparently uncaring for the presence of the stranger in the mansion.

No sounds came from the room, or any of the rooms nearby. But there should. There should be life in here, cobwebs, something.

Joey wiped the wetness peeking from his eyelids with the hem of his sweater.

God, he was _tired_.

So Joey was tired and realized that he really just should have headed home to his bed this morning, waited to cash in his fat paycheck and buy himself a bicycle for the summer, so he could go to work and make more money to buy more things and pay taxes like everyone and go clubbing with Tracey Simmonds' gang and maybe hook up with a stranger like everyone seemed to do these days and give actual sex a try and do his best to try and hide it from his friends and families as long as he could, or keep quiet about it if they ever found out so that he wouldn't upset them too much at summer barbecues in their parents' backyards.

You know, just a decent, average, 'just minding my own business' life.

He should _not _have been nursing second thoughts about whether or not he'd accidentally 'hurt' Seto Kaiba's so-called 'feelings' and he should certainly _not_ have lured himself into thinking Kaiba wasn't able to handle his own emotional life by himself. Assuming he _had _any? Heck, the guy didn't even have _friends_. He certainly wouldn't know what use to make of an apology, especially one that apparently wasn't needed in the first place.

Just... fuck.

_Me and my stupid ideas. __I'm outta here_.

He retraced his steps to that little lobby, hoping that he wouldn't cross paths with Clarissa because he wasn't in the mood to give her constructive feedback on her misguided attempts at helping her employer forge friendships. The lobby was devoid of the earlier bustle it had hosted. The kite had been taken away. One employee was kneeling by the boot rack. Beside him lay a circular, metal tin and a soiled, battered brush. And on the bench, staring at the spot where the kite had lain, or maybe outside, at the aerial spaces it had claimed, sat the younger master of the house, shoes off but still in his red and yellow windbreaker, hugging his knees.

Mokuba's hair was in a mess, and the wrappers from earlier had vanished by a feat of 'zealous housekeeping staff'.

The modern day servant began stroking a boot with the wax laden brush, turning a respectful blind eye the obvious melancholy of the boy. That scene angered Joey for some reason. It was pathetic in so many ways. Inexcusable, on so many grounds. _There's a kid welling up right behind you and you're not going to do shit about him? _Mokuba was just a kid, for sakes. A _kid_.

Joey took a moment to exhale the rage away. There would be a time for yelling his resent for the older Kaiba at the top of his lungs, or who knows, for forgiving him in the most pious of ways, and allowing himself to accept that those adrenaline-packed fights were a thing of the past. But now was not that time, and it definitely wasn't Mokuba's fault he ended up caught up in this ordeal. He sat next to, or rather behind, Mokuba. The boy stiffened, a sure sign that he'd sensed Joey's presence, even though he didn't look eager to acknowledge him.

"I'm sorry I ruined your morning," he started, bracing his knees with his hands for courage. It amazed him how freely the words had come out for Mokuba, and how costly they felt as far as his brother was concerned.

The boy shrugged.

"I should have known. I guess..." He scratched the back of his head. "I guess walking in on you guys wasn't the best idea."

Mokuba loosened his grip on his knees and let his feet slide to the ground. He then turned, facing the stone wall across him and giving Joey a striking view of his profile. There was indeed something changed about the boy. He was growing his brother's high cheekbones, and his eyes didn't look so childish anymore. Mokuba gripped the edge of the bench, arms locking straight at the elbows, shoulders tensing, crossing his legs at the ankles under the bench.

Then he shook his head, and replied to Joey in a whisper.

"It's not you."

The dramatic quality of the sigh that ensued made Joey feel slightly more guilty. Having his ego trampled on was one thing; ruining that kid's day, or week, or _month_, who knew, was something else altogether.

"Nah, it is. I messed everything up."

Joey wondered if Mokuba's whispering was a precursor of imminent tears – God knows Joey didn't want that on his conscience, he'd friggin' hate himself for _weeks_– but the shaky voice that normally accompanied it wasn't there.

"You alright?"

Mokuba nodded convincingly, then pointed at his throat in explanation.

"You have a sore throat?" Joey reformulated, to which the younger teen nodded some more. "That sucks."

Mokuba rocked forward a bit then nodded again, this time throwing a contagious smile in the mix. Joey himself felt better already. Then he came to a conclusion.

The least he could do was to cheer the kid's spirits up again before he bid the Kaiba mansion farewell.

"You know what's good for a sore throat?"

The boy met his eyes for the first time. He replied with a quizzical look.

"It's a drink I make. Well, I don't know if it really helps, but it's damn tasty. Wanna give it a try?"

Joey grinned at the boy's approving shrug.

"Okay, you need two things. Well _three _things. Honey, a lemon and hot water. And a mug and a knife. So I guess that makes five." He did that thing when he makes it look like the back of his head is itchy.

A second later Mokuba was up and standing, motioning for Joey to come along. They walked through moderately busy hallways until they were in the same kitchen area in which Clarissa had welcomed him earlier this morning. Every vertical or flat surface was made of that brushed, stainless steel Kaiba seemed so fond of, and those floors were so clean the five second rule didn't apply to them. The whole thing looked straight out of an upscale cafeteria kitchen, impersonal and sterile, but he knew how warm and lively it could feel. Maybe it had just been Clarissa. She could make a visit at the morgue sound fun. Okay, _tolerable_.

"So you're gonna show me where everything is, Mokie Moke?"

The kid had already set his mind to do just that, rummaging through the industrial size flour, sugar and various grain containers until he found for a small bucket of honey, then disappeared to an adjacent room and came back a minute later, through another passageway, with a handful of lemons and a small, sharp knife. Then he wordlessly tapped on Joey's knee so that he moved away to allow for the boy to reach for a kettle and a cutting board.

"You're almost kind of reading my mind, Mokie, that's scary if you ask me," and for all retort the boy gave Joey a disbelieving look. "Okay," he conceded good-heartedly, "that wasn't so hard to figure out. Not exactly a difficult recipe if you ask me, but there's a few tricks I gotta show you if you wanna get it just right."

After some detailed instructions on just how thick the slices should be for optimal flavoring - _don't remove the rind!_- and on how the water should be poured just as it's still bubbling inside the pot, Joey let Mokie pour himself his very first honey lemon drink à la Joey Wheeler.

"Don't pour it all just yet," he intervened, extending his hand so that he be given the spoonful of honey. "The honey never really goes off the spoon all at once, no matter how much you stir it, and the metal's burning hot so you can't lick it off. So you gotta- you gotta pour the rest of the hot water _on _the spoon, like this," and indeed the misty stream washed the thick golden paste away. Mokuba gave a small appreciative smile as Joey slowly pushed the mug to him, his hands hovering around it. He blew on it a few times, but knew just like Joey that this wasn't likely to be a very efficient cooling device, so he hiked himself up on a stool, and waited, Joey standing by his side on the kitchen island.

Joey leaned his elbows on the countertop, drumming his fingers against the cold, hard surface, giving a few glances around. Someone appeared from behind with a trolley full of boxes; probably some deliveries. Crazy old Kaiba just didn't do things like anybody else, not even his groceries. Joey then gave Mokuba a glance. Perhaps out of timidity, or out of impatience, the boy was staring intently at his untouchable drink.

"I hope you like it," Joey started for small talk's sake. "I don't mean to brag, but it's pretty good. I got lots of practice making it."

Mokuba turned to address him in a throaty whisper. "Your throat gets sore a lot?"

"Hm... No, it's for someone else," Joey summarized.

"That person gets a sore throat a lot?"

"You ask too many questions, kiddo," and he ruffled his hair, lightly, for good measure. Said 'kiddo' protested meekly, but really his delighted chuckles were a relief to Joey. _Some_one in the family wasn't a complete basket case.

Mokuba began kicking idly at the support bars of his stool. He blew on the drink's surface to create a small whirlpool, so that the citrus slice began spinning. Joey smiled. He hadn't given in to life's innocent pleasures in _ages_. Little things like blowing bubbles into his chocolate milk with a straw, or dipping cookies in milk until they were mushy and he had to dig it out with a spoon. Nowadays the cookies were munched on while running to the bus stop, the milk was carefully rationed, and he wasn't even sure those flexible colored straws that bent at the top still existed.

"My vocal chords are in my airways, so I can't drink anything to make it better, or else it would go in my lungs."

Joey blinked at what might just be Mokuba's longest whispered sentence to date. "What?"

"And the boiling water breaks the molecular bonds in the enzymes and vitamins in the honey so you lose a lot of what makes honey good for you."

"Er..."

"B-but I'm sure it's very, very good, Joey," the boy amended, topping his deconstruction of the Wheeler family recipe with an eager, encouraging grin. He looked like he was going to give Joey a sparkly sticker and stamp a smiley face on the back of his hand.

Joey shook his head in amazed disbelief. He really should hate the kid for going all 'I know biology' on his ass, but he couldn't. Instead, he found himself feeling... thankful. "I didn't know all that." He looked away and shook his head once more. "Wow." Then back to Mokuba: "I guess I gotta change my technique, then."

Mokuba shook his head vigorously and leaned into his mug to take a brave first, noisy sip, then give Joey an enthusiastic thumbs up.

Joey smiled bashfully. "It's good? Even without the enzymes?" He teased.

The boy nodded some more, raising his eyebrows.

"You're something alright, Mister Moke." Joey chuckled to himself. "Mind if I call you that?"

Joey knew exactly how to interpret the boy's shrug- carefully crafted as to appear detached and nonchalant, yet...

He grabbed some of the least appealing lemon slices on the cutting board, dumped them in the extra mug that Mokuba had brought for him, and poured water inside until it was half full.

They spent the next few minutes in a comfortable silence punctuated by the opening of cupboards and the sliding of boxes in the other room, Mokuba taking more and more daring sips, Joey gently tapping at the sides of his own mug, sometimes lifting it in the air to give it a swirl or two.

"Sometimes I wonder how you and your brother can be related."

What Joey had just uttered was more of a self-reflective statement than anything else, but the boy was right next to him and just because he wasn't really talkative today didn't mean he wouldn't process what Joey had just said.

"I mean, I've been hanging out with you for what, half an hour? And I completely forgot that I was feeling like shit earlier, and the day before, and the day before that." And the week before that, and the winter before that, and the year before that... "You've got something special, Mister Moke. You know that?"

The boy returned his gaze evenly, more like he was studying Joey somehow, then resumed nursing the whirlpool inside his mug.

A young man half jogged into the kitchen, not exactly running but the impatient clipping of his soles against the tiled floor left doubt that he was in a rush; he belonged to the kind who have no time to waste. Joey and Mokuba heard him, in the room adjacent to theirs, call out to 'anyone who could make this quick and by quick I mean _yesterday_'. Joey stifled a chuckle when he heard an unhurried, male voice ask him that he 'please step away' and that 'yes, I _know_ how he likes his coffee' and the anxious, erratic clipping of soles echoed again and Mokuba whispered "it's for _him_."

"Him-_who_," replied Joey, but he knew very well who was being talked about. He averted his gaze when the man darted out of the room, shaky hands carrying a tiny cup and saucer. Joey hoped at least one of Kaiba's employee ever spit in his coffee, but then again the thought wasn't as entertaining as it once could have been, it was kind of childish actually, so he tossed it aside.

"He's upset," said Mokuba again in that breathy voice, without bothering with details, as if that statement was an explanation in itself.

Joey then asked, not without cursing himself for breaking his tacit vow 'not to give a single damn about Kaiba ever again' so soon after having taken it: "Upset at what?"

Mokuba simply shrugged.

_Ah. _

"Hm." He took another swig of his own botched drink, wincing at the all lemon, no sugar infusion. "How upset is he? I mean compared to normal."

Another shrug.

_Okay then. I guess it's better I don't know, anyway. I'm not supposed to give a flying f-_

"A lot."

_Damn it. _

"And I think I know why," Mokuba whispered solemnly, shoulders sagging, eyes downcast.

"Come again?"

"Nothing." The boy began kicking away at the kitchen island they were settled at. Took another, longer swig of his special drink, set his hands flat on the counter top. Then a timid heaving of the chest, inflating with the courage so characteristic of a confession: "Last week, I-"

-and then Joey couldn't register anything that Mokuba said, at all, because Clarissa walked by _at that very moment_, engaged in lively chatter with a younger female dressed in the exact same apron and dress and all, and the smile on the lady's face, oh the _smile _Clarissa wasn't even trying to hide upon seeing the two teenagers bonding over hot drinks – it made Joey not want to resent how she was all kinds of wrong to place any hopes in a hypothetical friendship between himself and the charming Seto Kaiba – it made Joey sort of think having given Kaiba a try might just be worth it since it was so obviously making her day, and well, that must be counting for something.

"Sorry, Mokuba, could you just repeat that last part? I got distracted."

Mokuba sighed some more. "It's not important."

Aw, crap. Crapcrapcrap. _Think fast, Wheeler. Think fast. _

"Look." He twisted to look Mokuba in the face - er, in the profile. "I'm positive it has nothing to do with you. Kaiba – I mean, your brother, he's got lots to think about all day, with the company and all." He made some kind of meaningless gesture with his hands. "You know."

When Mokuba sighed some wires crossed in Joey's brain and he thought of those innocuous, dark grey clouds that roll in the sky before a summer thunderstorm strikes, harsh enough to fell trees on power lines.

"Mister Moke."

No reaction. That mug sure looked interesting.

"Mokie. Hey. Mokie, look at me."

Maybe Mokuba shouldn't have been so brave and obeyed so quickly because seeing his quivering, pursed lips and shining eyes was just - it shouldn't be _legal_.

Joey carefully seized him by the shoulders.

"It's not you. It's not _because of_ you. Maybe your brother isn't even angry," he rambled on, making up stuff on the spot, "maybe that's just his normal. But _you - didn't_- make him angry. You got that?"

Mokuba's lips twitched hideously, parting just enough to let out an ominous sigh.

"I g- g- s-s-s," the boy managed to let out before his entire torso jolted at the first sob.

The second sob was muffled into Joey's chest.

And the next one.

And the one after that.

Joey rubbed Mokuba's back in regular, circular motions, long enough that his fingertips became numb from the friction, and soon there were no more heaving sobs.

He lifted his head, and lay his chin at the top of Mokuba's head.

And closed his eyes.

They were blessed with the luxury of a silence perfect save for the faint humming of a refrigerator.

Then a sniffle. And another. The rubbing motions resumed, and their bodies began rocking gently, swaying from side to side, as if on their own accord.

"I'm sorry," Joey murmured blindly into Mokuba's hair, kissing it, "I'm so sorry."


	8. Day Six II

Two surprises. One: Mokuba Kaiba was ticklish.

Two: there was a room in the mansion that felt almost _normal_.

Actually more like the 'wicked awesome version of every teenage boy's dream bedroom slash gaming room slash living room'. It was ripe with cushions and fancy sleeved blankets (all stashed inside a wooden bench-chest that Joey had renamed The Treasure Chest) and last but not least mother-flipping _beanie bags_, which had always been Joey's ultimate childhood non-sexual fantasy.

At the moment of writing, our hero was surrounded by a good half-dozen of them carefully arranged in a rather comfortable nest-like contraption that Mokuba had happily helped build in exchange for a truce; if Joey tried to tickle him some more he'd only end up destroying his plush fort and the master of the gaming room made it clear (putting the seemingly hereditary Kaiba stare to good use) that he wouldn't help him rebuild it, nor would he any forts of any kind in the future.

And, well, Joey was, secretly, quite fond of forts.

So.

So now Joey felt compelled to sit upright, because his near horizontal position was nowhere near propitious to the vehement button-mashing of the one sequence that would enable his character to effectively grab Mokuba's (character's) legs, spin him in the air and smash him on the ground. He'd done it by accident once and hadn't been able to replicate the miracle.

As for Mokuba, his infuriatingly deft handling of the controller was earning him a savory winning streak. The pre-teen's agile fingers barely seemed to move at all, like hummingbird's wings, but they did, as Joey was able to ascertain right before one earlier, and particularly humiliating, virtual defeat. And the boy wasn't even maxing the game; no, he was doing this rather annoying thing where one purposely lets the CPU pick one's character and weapons, because 'I always do that anyway, Joey'. It was rather obvious that he had a thing for the swift little female dancer slash fighter, because whenever he got her all he did was annoy the heck out of Joey by dodging all his blows and striking him from behind exclusively.

When he got her for the umpteenth time Joey adopted two tried and true techniques, one consisting of 'not even bothering anymore' and the other of 'pressing A over and over again'. The good thing with that plan of action was that it allowed Joey to blink from time to time. After having spent the last day and a half fully awake, his eyes felt dry, especially when staring at a TV screen so long.

"You're not even trying," Mokuba protested in his new throaty voice.

"I'll catch up, I'll catch up. It's only... seventeen to three. Erm."

Mokuba paused the fight.

"Okay," Joey began, "I'll make it up to you, but some other time." He gently tossed his controller aside. "Just go ahead without me. I'll watch you go on adventure mode."

Mokuba made one of those faces that makes one want to end world hunger, but four seconds later he was restarting the console. Surely having a gaming companion was a rare and treasured occurrence for the younger Kaiba. But anyone who had played video games a bit knew that there was at least equal pleasure to be had in being watched playing solo by friends and siblings. Or by a sibling's non-friend, in Joey's case.

The blond knew he should properly unplug and stash his controller away, or at least sit up adequately so he could be closer to Mokuba. He didn't want the boy to have to strain his voice to chat with him.

Unfortunately for his good manners, Joey felt rather comfortable as he was and decided the controller wouldn't suffer from spending a bit more time on the carpeted floor of the super special awesome Kaiba gaming room. Actually, he should really go home. The salty streaks on Mokuba's cheek, only reminder and re_main_der of his earlier bout of a strange thing Seto would attribute to hormonal imbalance, had long dried up, and the kid's eyes were no longer red around the rims. It looked like Joey's job here was done.

But not.

Somehow Joey got the irking feeling that things weren't alright between the two brothers. They'd always been inseparable. Their faith in one another, unquestionable. Two sides of the same coin... Or was it a double-edge sword? _Whatever - I'm so tired..._

Maybe that was how real life actually was between the two brothers. You know, when their existence wasn't being threatened by the evil forces surrounding them and the world in general. Maybe there was, in a tiny rip of the space-time fabric, room for Seto and Mokuba to be ordinary human beings with quarrels and struggles; an alien form of sibling rivalry that was otherwise unheard of to their fellow mortals.

Maybe that was a sign Joey should stop meddle with their affairs. This wasn't his world, his place to be.

He wanted to open his mouth to tell Mokuba that he was leaving, but a yawn sneaked out instead. His jaw muscles tingled pleasantly from the stretch, and he scrunched his eyes to bleed out the mist that had risen there from fatigue. He shot a last glance at Mokuba's still form, his calmly hunched over silhouette, entirely focused on beating digital villains to a pulp, then Joey judged it wise to stretch his eyelids, too, or let them rest, or relax, or whatever.

.

He was stirred from his dreamless nap by a hand putting pressure on his chest, and then withdrawing as if a spring. There were footsteps; hurried, irregular. Retreating.

"Mister Moke?"

Instead of the murmured reply that a half-asleep Joey was expecting to hear came a sigh that any human, no, any primate would have unmistakably interpreted as _deeply annoyed, bordering on furious_.

Still, the blond's sleep-deprived brain found it hard to give any, pardon the language, _fuck_ about the intruder's mood, and willed its body back to sleep. Joey would have rolled back in his sheets if it weren't for the sudden red light peeking from behind his eyelids and a vague feeling that warmth was missing somewhere.

He opened his eyes.

This wasn't his bed; this was a nest made of beanie bags and cushions, and Joey knew from the sight of a blanket strewn carelessly a few feet away that the pressure on his chest had been a person, had been a little sleepy Mokuba. There was a plate with a sandwich crust on it, a little bottled juice and another of those wrappers he'd seen in the lobby earlier. How long had he been sleeping like this, that Mokuba felt the need to play nurse with him?

Next to the TV stood Kaiba, impassible, arms folded in a hostile pose, threatening to utter his impatient sigh of doom once more.

"Mgnh," Joey managed in his amoeba-like mental state. His eyes felt heavy still from the short sleep; his brain was a dry sponge stuck inside an even drier skull; his sweaty hair reassuringly clinging to his forehead. "Oh man. What time is it?"

Kaiba's glare intensified. Joey took it for the answer it was.

He sat up - inefficiently, mind you - and proceeded to unceremoniously rub the moisture off his eyes. Mokuba was nowhere to be seen, but the game - it looked like it had been set on mute - wasn't even paused. The kid had scurried away. Joey exhaled and cleaned up his act.

"I'm leaving," he said hastily, untangling his legs from the plushy masses. He knew Kaiba was pissed; he knew he wasn't going to beat him up, either. So long as he got out of his sight soon enough.

"You have twenty minutes," the unintentional host said, turning on his heel, and Joey had the bizarre thought that maybe Seto also had rolled his tongue seven times in his mouth just so he _wouldn't_ utter whatever he pointedly _didn't_ tell his unintentional guest, just a few seconds ago.

_Twenty minutes for what? _

_Fuck, I have mid-late-afternoon-morning wood. _

Kaiba was out of sight when Joey finally managed to piece everything together. He breathed out an incredulous 'fuck me' before he decided to tail Kaiba once and for all.

Kaiba was nowhere to be seen in the maze of hallways and closed doors, but Joey knew if he could find a familiar spot he could retrace his room.

And if he wasn't there, then that meant Joey wasn't wanted.

Two turns and exactly fourteen doors later, the decor had become inorganic, metallic, cold. Joey had an inkling where he was but he didn't want to push just any door. The last thing he wanted was to be kicked out of the property for having trespassed, inadvertently set off an alarm.

The door at the end of the hallway was definitely familiar. He risked opening it.

It was the octagonal room. With the tall rouge curtains, the useless antique furniture, the paintings. The black sculpture (was it an angel? Joey couldn't remember) at its center. The tips of the young man's wings were drenched in setting sunlight. Wow. It was just _that_ late. Now Joey wouldn't be able to sleep properly tonight, and his sleep pattern would be back to SNAFU in time for the school week. _Joy_. A chill woke the little hairs on his forearms and Joey remembered he was only down to his preppy polo. The sweatshirt had been left somewhere in the gaming room out back.

He'd taken it off to remove the wet stains from Mokuba's sight. And now he wished he hadn't; this room was either on air conditioning, or just very badly lit, because its temperature was as chilling as its looks. Joey's eyes had found the ghastly sacrificial painting (Genesis 22, brought to you by Sunday School sometime when Joey was in grade 5, which is way too early for any child to learn about how a father nearly killed his own son).

Screw that shirt. Joey wouldn't go and get it. Good riddance. It didn't matter. He hated it anyway, and he could always let his mom pester him into clothes shopping for him if she wanted so badly for him to wear another one. She seemed to be on a generosity streak those days, although with those ever shifting moods of hers, Joey had better count his blessings.

He allowed himself to walk a bit more freely around the room. No one was around, no Clarissa, no one to follow. The windows gave in to a more attractive landscape, if you can call a few mid-size trees an embellishment to an otherwise barren looking place. It was bright out but dawning on evening. Evening? He'd been sleeping that long?

And most importantly, Mokuba had… He'd been staying right next to Joey all this time? Let him sleep? Gone for lunch and come back?

Joey turned on his heel and headed toward where he knew Kaiba's bedroom was.

Hm. Fourth door on the right.

Or was it?

He knocked, for good measure.

Nothing.

Looked down at his feet, just to see if there was light coming from under the door.

But there was a stopper, something tight, soundproof perhaps.

"Kaiba." He knocked again. "Come on. Let's talk."

He heard a handle rattle, then the door next to his opened and was left to rotate loosely at its hinges. Well apparently it was the _third_ on the right. Joey walked in measured steps to the opened door. Kaiba was waiting inside, sitting at his desk.

Well, waiting is a big word.

"You've used up six of your minutes," the host said idly, and in Kaiba-ese 'idly' meant 'deliberate', meant 'calculated'.

He was performing a rather good impersonation of the deftly busy businessman, but Joey knew better. Kaiba's hands looked healthy and useful alright. And the man didn't look all that skin and bones, either.

Maybe it was all that sun-soaking he'd had with his little brother. Not that Joey was complaining.

Lukewarm remnants of his early-evening-morning wood?

Check.

Awkward much?

Check.

"Er, I won't be long, anyway."

Kaiba's shoulders stiffened. His typing slowed slightly, and his eyes began flickering here and there.

"I hope you've had a good day," Kaiba dropped icily, a mortifying attempt at small talk that felt like foreplay to a torture session.

"I told her you did the paper all by yourself," Joey began, warming up his humility muscles in view of the salvageable apology to come. "The teacher."

Kaiba dropped whatever excuse he had of looking too busy to grant Joey his full attention and pushed his swivel chair back, the tips of his fingers hanging on to the edge of the desk, his forearms still like a precarious bridge.

"… Your loss, then." Meaning: _there's nothing I can do for you_.

"She said she'd let me redo it with an extension. By myself." Had he insisted on that last word? No. Had he anything to prove to himself? Certainly not.

Kaiba twirled to face Joey, not crossing his legs quite yet. He sat there, stuck between two courses of actions Joey couldn't fathom.

"What is it that you want," Kaiba said like a reprimand, like it wasn't a question at all, like he really meant for Joey to aim at his head to ensure a painless death, which from Kaiba is as merciful a gesture as it gets.

Joey took a step forward.

"I want." A pause. And then an inhale. Joey focused all his energies on trying to muster the- the 'serious'- the 'earnest' required to muster the guts necessary to speak his mind. "Um."

His eyes were fixed on Kaiba's, who was holding his gaze with fierce integrity.

Then the CEO dropped his gaze, and let his head, and voice, drop a little.

"How much."

Joey blinked. Or maybe it had only been a frown so deep it had drastically reduced his field of vision. "Huh?"

"How much. Dollars. Numerical values. You can count, can't you?"

"I don't want to _buy_ your stupid book, I just want to borrow it." _Stupid book? Really, Joey?_

The left corner of Kaiba's lip turned upward, and then the man's midsection was shaken by a violent spasm followed by a sharp exhale of air through the nose and mouth - something resembling a chuckle.

"A book."

"You know," Joey frowned, foreseeing a decline in his sense of wit proportional to the rising dissatisfaction he felt at being mocked by Kaiba, "The Catcher in the Nile."

Kaiba stared at him.

Then made a move to reach for his phone.

Without thinking, Joey surged forward, almost pouncing on the receiver, enclosing his hand on top of Kaiba's, securing the contraption where it belonged. Kaiba's hand felt warm. Joey's boxer briefs felt a tad tighter.

"You're not kicking me out," Joey growled. "Deal with me like a man." He then withdrew his hand, and Kaiba did the same.

Kaiba smiled to himself.

"What?"

"I wasn't calling security. You think I can't handle you by myself?"

Kaiba's tone was a bit too… sour for Joey's tastes. And as far as Kaiba is concerned, just a little sour is too sour. The blond took a deep breath and stepped back, figuring now was a good time as ever to roll his own tongue inside his own mouth before making an even bigger idiot (according to Kaiba, apparently) of himself. It was only then that he noticed the inconspicuous check book comfortably set on Kaiba's desk, next to his keyboard.

"For your information I was going to call the Research Center of Primatology, see if they could pick your brains to find the Missing Link."

"Very funny."

At least it wasn't a mutt joke?

"But I think the Humane Society is what you need."

"Oh, _fuck_ you." It rolled, no, it _flew_ off his tongue, too fast for him to hold back. Kaiba gave out a half-hearted, dry laugh, and a muttered reply.

"Fuck _me_."

It was meant for no one in particular, yet it surprised both men in the room.

From the way he indolently swept his downcast eyes everywhere on the desk, on the keyboard, on the expectant check book, Kaiba didn't even look like he wished he could take it back.

Joey found himself filled up with a sense of dread he'd never before experienced. _H__e isn't a robot__. T__here's a human trapped in there__. _Joey found himself looking for any kind of twitch in Kaiba's fingers. Just - oh _God_. Kaiba wasn't even furious or anything. Just... exposed.

"You know I lied the other day," Joey began, regretting instantly to have started a conversation he didn't want to have about cocks, more specifically his own, and what kinds of things he'd like to see performed on it, and by whom.

"Oh did you."

Had Kaiba's voice not dripped with hostility, or with not as much hostility let's say (one has to be reasonable), Joey would have gone on and explained what he had lied about the other day. But the trademark Kaiba smirk was a remarkably efficient turn off, and Joey wasn't in the mood to baby-sit the emotionally stunted anymore.

"Never mind."

"Never mind what?"

"I'm not up for your mind games, Kaiba."

"You're the one who invited himself here."

_And ruined an otherwise perfectly happy morning with my little brother_, was the subtext. Oh, Joey was smart enough to read between the lines when he wanted to.

"Yeah well I'm sorry I did."

That came out... harsher than intended.

"I mean I was just dropping by on my way home-"

"Oh, dropping by. Yes."

Fucking Kaiba and his fucking sarcasm.

"Do you- Like, are you actually enjoying this? Oh you do. You so do. You spend your nights alone, here, being all like, pathetic, in your pathetic room-"

"Do you enjoy telling yourself you're straight?"

Joey froze.

Kaiba looked at the blond pointedly, like he had just played a Fool's Mate.

"I think you do," he went on, "you're like a six year old, blowing candles off a cake, wishing the same thing year after year, keeping it a secret not to jinx it."

And then a snicker.

"Shut the fuck up," said Joey's rage, to which Joey approved. "I'm not like you."

"Repeating it won't make it true," Seto insisted.

Joey glanced at the check book. "I'm not like you," he repeated, though this time it meant something completely different. He even felt a little calmer for it. "I'm not desperate enough to think anyone who steps too close to me, they want to, uh-"

"Do you need a hand with that retort? A dictionary, perhaps?"

"You thought I wanted to _blackmail_ you, you stupid, pathetic _fuck_."

A tremor on Kaiba's features. Too brief to be caught with the naked eye.

"And you think anyone on this planet would want to blackmail _you_ of all people? You're a chronically broke, incapable _loser_. Anyone can _smell_ the failure from miles away. It's in your DNA."

"Yeah, well, I don't know where you learned how to be such a, uh, such a fucking, pathetic, loser asshole _reject_, 'cause I swear you and Mokuba don't look like you're related."

"Shut up," Kaiba hissed. In the blink of an eye he was standing up, palms spread flat out on his desk. "Shut your trap, mutt."

"That's all you can fucking say, huh, telling me to shut up. And you call yourself smart."

"You're a waste of oxygen."

"Not very original, either. You're starting to sound like my old man. Good night, Kaiba."

And he headed for the door, not giving Kaiba a chance to come at him again.

God knew why he of all people had to be the target of his sexual fantasies as of late.

"I..."

Joey stopped in his tracks.

"... I thought you had something to tell me."

"What, because you're going to _listen_?"

_Don't turn around, don't give him the upper hand. _

"If you're not yapping."

_Fuck, Kaiba you're not making things easy for me. _

"I thought my twenty minutes were up."

Kaiba The Caustic Human Clock glanced at his monitor, readying himself to keep his guest posted on the exact status of his self-appointed countdown of sorts, but then, um, nope, nothing.

Joey smirked to himself before spinning on his heel to face the man who, a few days ago, had not so subtly groped his knee in a possible attempt to, uh, communicate a desire to…

"I wanted to know why-"

"That's a question, Wheeler. Telling and asking are two very different things."

Joey huffed at the insufferable nature of his imaginary masturbation companion. _Be the better man gotta be the better man_-

"Okay, then." Joey stepped forward. "You were away on Friday. I mean you weren't at school."

Kaiba gave him a sideways look. "That's it. That's your revelation, _so_ important you had to show up on my doorstep on a Sunday morning."

"You make what you want of it." And then Joey crossed his arms, readying himself for the wait, curious to know what plan of action Kaiba would take next.

Kaiba sighed. "… I was on a business trip."

"Right."

"You make what you want of it," mimicked Kaiba, upholding Joey's gaze.

"Hpmh."

A scoff.

They weren't going to go far if they were to rely on Kaiba to row the pride boat.

Joey made a face - internally - like he was going to eat cold liver soup, or week old leftovers, or something. He let out a sigh so deep and loud it felt almost theatrical, even to himself.

"You know I'd be pissed if I were you, too."

There.

_Out. _

_SUCCESS. _

Trap card: Apology: Activated.


	9. Day Six III, Day Seven

"You know, I'd be pissed if I were _you_, too." Joey couldn't look at Kaiba in the face.

There lurked about the room a silence riddled with hesitation.

This lame ass apology _had_ to be enough, like, it had to 'suffice'. It had to because Joey wasn't venturing any deeper in 'apology' terrain. Not unless Kaiba was doing his part as well. Kaiba delicately unglued his palms from his desk, folding his arms on his chest. He prolonged the silence - this wasn't Joey's doing, he'd already made his move, it wasn't his place to speak now, all he had to do was wait. It was Kaiba's turn now.

This shouldn't be that difficult. Kaiba was a child genius. Surely 'reading between the lines' was written somewhere on his one inch thick resume.

_Come on, Kaiba. _Say something. React.

Then the prodigy's face finally thawed; he smirked.

"I was in San Francisco until this morning. I scarcely had time to be 'pissed off', as you put so eloquently."

Kaiba was now standing at full height, chin high, every single inch the glory he masqueraded as on the front pages of magazines. The finely cut features, the pleasant silhouette, the imposing stature - all but a deceiving trick of light of the barely lit room. But Joey knew better. He had seen the low battery Kaiba, the out of order Kaiba, the one defective prototype that had better remain hidden from the outside world and the so easily shakable faith of its stockholders and brokers and speculators.

Now Kaiba was doing this thing where he pretends to be busy again, not so subtly stashing the compromising checkbook away in a drawer.

"Come on man," Joey started to win some time, just to catch Kaiba's attention before it slipped away completely, not knowing what to do with any of his too numerous limbs, "you- you know what I'm talking about."

"Do you?" The drawer closed on itself with a muted 'thump'. Kaiba looked down, his voice taking a raw texture when he spoke again. "Ask yourself what it is that you really came here for, Wheeler."

_I know what you wanted. _

That is the thought that spontaneously came to Joey's head. But that was no explanation as to why he kept coming back here. Three times in one week.

Kaiba pinned him down with a stare, making it difficult for Joey to move, speak or even think. It was as if though his eyes were pushing against Joey's words, drowning them inside his throat, shoving them inside his chest, leaving them to fall freely at the pit of his stomach.

_I think I want the same. _

The admission, however humble in wording, felt victorious, or rather, _defiant_ to Joey; like he was thinking it for someone else's benefit - an absent audience. A wave of heat flushed over Joey, causing the little hairs on his arms and nape to rise. Some warmth settled in his groin. Joey swallowed a mouthful of nothing at the thought of what _might have_ happened that other night. He refused to think of what might happen tonight; there was no _after_, there was only a _now_, in which Kaiba was holding him hostage.

Joey was suddenly aware of how hard his heart was beating, and an uncomfortable tightness settled in his throat when he opened his mouth to speak. But to say what? And how?

Kaiba scoffed in annoyance. Normally, normally its should've broken down some of the tension.

But Joey's arms and legs still refused to move.

Kaiba looked away and went to the other end of the room, stopping at a door near the bookshelves, and untangled something Joey couldn't see from around his neck. The object was inserted into a lock, and the door silently gave under a measured pressure from Kaiba's outstretched fingers. He gave Joey a long, knowing look, then disappeared inside the room.

This was a sign. Maybe. A message. Joey didn't want to know what it meant - he did, of course, but he didn't want to think it out loud.

Joey strained his ears to see if he could hear Kaiba's footsteps. Nothing.

So he traced Kaiba's steps.

Stood still at the very spot he had given Joey his becoming stare. Looked into the pitch black room.

Behind him the main room wasn't lit except for the computer screen and the waning light peering from the bare windows. Outside, the last sun rays were hitting the walls of the estate terrain, giving it an eerie orange glow. Above the sparse trees, the evening sky was blue going on indigo, going on grey, going on black. Joey looked into the black room with a certain apprehension.

Surely it was a matter of seconds before Kaiba would emerge, explain himself, or even better, send Joey packing with a bundle of rehearsed insults and a free pass to a clear conscience. Then Joey would be able to go back home with at least the illusion that something unnamable had been resolved, leaving behind all and any scraps of guilt he'd been harboring over the last week.

"Kaiba?"

Streaks of yellow light shone faintly at the edges of what Joey assumed to be windows. His eyes gradually adjusted to the darkness. He made out Kaiba's silhouette, standing in front of what Joey guessed were bookshelves. In a corner he guess laid a heap of furniture, chairs mounted on one another in the most decadent fashion.

Joey stepped inside.

The smell of dust and old paper momentarily shut off his airways. After a third hesitant step, Joey stubbed his knee against an inconveniently placed piece of furniture. _This is a storage room_, he realized, _this is where he dumps his overpriced antiques. _But why make it adjacent to his bedroom? Even if it was built in this way... the Kaiba he knew wouldn't hesitate to tear apart entire walls or wings of his mansion if he deemed them unsuitable, so this - this had to be of special importance to him.

Kaiba was walking towards him, avoiding invisible obstacles as he went.

He stopped in front of Joey, and shoved a book against his chest.

"There."

From this up close Joey could outline Kaiba's features. Their surroundings were too dark to allow for any speck of light to glow in his eyes. It gave Kaiba a somber air that Joey didn't like, for reasons he didn't know he had until this moment. There was always something shining in Kaiba's eye, a readiness to bite and sting, to fight and conquer.

But there was nothing now.

Kaiba still held the book against Joey's chest, his fingernails digging uncomfortably in Joey's skin. The air in the room felt stuffy. Breathing deeply was not an option.

Joey couldn't bear to look into Kaiba's expressionless eyes anymore. He stared at the glowing outlines of the barricaded windows. Kaiba released his grip. The book fell on the floor.

This wasn't about The Catcher in the Rye. This wasn't about a school assignment anymore. This was about the unspoken conversation neither of them wanted to be having.

There remained a sensation of pressure where Kaiba's thumb had lain.

Joey searched for Kaiba's eyes again. Kaiba's downcast eyes.

Kaiba kneeling down. Kaiba running confident hands on Joey's legs, his grip firmer where his thighs met his knees.

Joey swallowed. Kaiba's voice filled his ears, flat and sober.

"You dropped your book."

"Y-Yeah," Joey replied, the sound of his heartbeat ringing louder in his eardrums than his own voice. He didn't know what was happening. Or he knew. Oh yes he knew.

A hand slid up between Joey's thighs. So this was 'it'. Oh this was _so_ 'it'. Joey's breath caught in his throat and more blood rushed to his already undeniable erection.

Wherever the hand roamed, there built up a warmth Joey felt he didn't deserve.

This wasn't like anything he'd imagined.

This was real.

No airbrushed porn models, no glossy finish. This was Seto Kaiba undoing his pants with astounding dexterity. Seto Kaiba efficiently sliding his fingers inside the rim of his boxer briefs, taking the whole thing down in one swift move and exhaling softly, sending gushes of warm air rolling at the base of Joey's cock down to his balls, making them tingle. A jolt of pleasure shot up Joey's spine, then another when a slight wet sound was heard from inside Seto's mouth.

Joey's breath was shaky, his chest rising and falling in uncontrollable staccato movements. Perhaps this was how it felt for Seto's fingers to tremble against his will. Joey wished more than anything to have a wall against which he could lean. He couldn't help but stumble back when Kaiba engulfed him, and he couldn't help but moan when his lips slid away. He hadn't been ready for it; you can never be ready for a first time.

"Hold still," Kaiba ordered just as Joey whined '_again'_ against his own will.

Still he held.

Kaiba set his hands on each side of Joey's hips and resumed the act. Joey closed his eyes, taking in the faint humming sound of a fan, the smell of dusty old books, the warmth around his cock.

For a moment nothing else happened in the world, except for that rhythmical motion and the pleasure rising in his balls. Sometimes Kaiba did something strange and incredibly pleasant that had his lips reach the base of Joey's shaft. Whenever he withdrew his breath was loud and labored, irregular and _needy_. In a matter of minutes Joey had reached a plateau he'd never imagined was possible to reach through masturbation alone; he arched his head back, hands hovering about Kaiba's head, unsure whether he wanted to run his fingers through the silky brown hair, or to hold onto his skull and ram into his mouth.

The plateau slid from under Joey and suddenly 'the signs' were there, strong and fleeting and _embarrassingly early_; for all warning Joey gagged an inexcusably feeble '_I'm-'_ that had Kaiba speeding up the pace, and three thrusts later the helpless virgin was _coming inside Seto Kaiba's mouth_.

Then there wasn't a mouth on him anymore. Joey was left to his own devices, hard and pulsating. Kaiba's hair was now out of reach from his lonely fingers, and he felt the cold air of the room against his over sensitive skin.

Joey could feel his heart beating in his groin. Kaiba remained completely still in his kneeling position. By reflex Joey brought his thumb and index to the little nook at the base of the head, coaxing out the last droplets of his come. He wiped the tip clean and licked the thing off, thinking that for once the mingled scents on his fingers weren't just his.

What was the etiquette in a situation like this? Back in the day guys in the gang would brag about getting sucked off by so and so, leaving the scene like it wasn't any of their concern. Would Kaiba expect that? Was this how gays did it, giving blow jobs away just for the heck of it, without love or emotion, asking nothing in return?

Or was Joey supposed to offer something in return?

"Do you, like... Do you..." Joey began, as per usual having no idea how to finish the sentence he'd started, never quite knowing what the mighty Seto Kaiba might want to hear.

"Get out."

Kaiba's voice had been so low it creaked in places, so breathy it was almost a whisper.

"Look, uh-"

"Get out," he said again, calmly.

This time the command sounded like one, and not like the desolate constatation that what had just taken place could not be undone.

Joey pulled his apparel up, fastened his jeans as fast as his unresponsive fingers allowed, then announced his leave with a mild nod that could in no manner be visible to his benefactor. By now he knew the mansion to see himself out without risking bumping into a certain motherly employee. His dad hadn't given him 'the talk' (yet), so it was definitely not Clarissa's place to do so, especially not _now_.

.

The TV was blasting full volume in the living room. Joey's old man immediately turned to look at him, indicating he was in a mood for chatter - one unforeseen obstacle between his hands and the sequel to what had positively been his most intense orgasm to date.

"You should've told me you weren't coming for supper," the man said without lifting his eyes off the screen, in what was meant to pass as a nonchalant, indifferent voice. But Joey knew better.

"Yeah, I'm late."

"Yeah, well, I _saw_ that."

Joey was too bothered by the uncomfortable stickiness of his cock glued to his balls to feel sorry about not letting his famously responsible father know what time he'd be heading back to home sweet home. The TV raged on. That was just how unspectacular Joey Wheeler's real life was, even after having had the most bizarre encounter ever. This was no little deal; it was a _big_ flipping deal, it was the day that Joey semi-lost his virginity to a guy he didn't even know thought about him that way.

Yet the world kept spinning just fine.

"There's hamburger helper on the stove if you'd like. Cheeseburger macaroni."

The smell of his favorite childhood comfort food reached Joey's nostrils that very moment. "Gee, Dad, you went all out." One had to take pleasure - or solace - in life's little pleasures, if he wanted to stay sane.

The man emitted a satisfied grunt. Joey took off his sneakers the quick and dirty way, meaning without untying the laces, forcing his heels out. This apartment wasn't the most tidy or clean or easy on the eyes, but it was _his_ and had the merit of being reasonably homey, not to mention warmer than the frisky evening air that had been teasing his naked arms all along the one and a half hour long walk across the city.

"Goodfellas is playing on channel nine."

Joey noticed that his father wasn't sitting in the middle of the couch. And that there was a bowl of chips on the coffee table nearby.

Cock. Sticking to balls. _Itchy_.

"Uh, I gotta do some homework for tomorrow."

Besides, they'd already seen Goodfellas many times together. It was their special movie, father and son. But maybe another time. Tonight Joey had experienced something a thousand times more special, and whether it was to reflect on it, or celebrate it, or lament the gross mistake that had been 'it', Joey needed some time alone, not being awkwardly, one-arm cuddled by a father with an irregular streak of displays of affection. Anyway he was sure to fall asleep mid-movie if he settled on the couch with his dad; that afternoon nap had only done so much to let Joey rest.

_Sorry, Dad. _

"Thanks for the macaroni. I'll just eat it in my room, okay?"

The father didn't reply. There was a car ad on TV, the spotless vehicle roaming about on mesmerizing stretches of road no one would ever drive on in real life. A luxury the Wheeler would never have. Joey pried his eyes off the screen.

"I'll... I'll come and watch the rest of it when I'm done, 'kay?"

The father didn't move. Cut off from his realm of attention, Joey walked to the little red LED shining on the oven. He stealthily tugging on his underwear as soon as he was out of his father's line of vision. _Relief_.

The burner was still on, keeping the contents of the pot warm a little too well. The lid dripped when Joey took it off, and a few scratches with the nearby wooden spoon told him that the pasta touching at the bottom of the pot had begun to burn. Joey's heart squeezed a little when he realized just how long this meal must've been sitting there, waiting for him.

He turned the heat off and took the thing to his bedroom, deciding he would eat straight from the pot, cooking spoon and all, to at least spare himself - or God willing, his father - the extra dish washing effort that would otherwise ensue. His backpack was waiting for him by his bedside, full of barely used textbooks that died to be consulted. While Joey had had no real intention to 'study' or 'do homework' initially, he now figured that now was a good time as ever to transform his previous white-lie to his father into a _non_-lie. Joey settled on the mattress, reminding himself that he was also sitting on a pile of pseudo-straight porn magazines.

The contents of the pot were still hot; he blew on the rising mist as if it would cool the thing down. He broke into a cynical grin - was Kaiba's obnoxious condition contagious? - and said to himself, or nobody in particular, 'happy birthday, faggot'.

.

Math was just _not_ sinking in.

Joey distractedly stared at less than meaningful equations, blinking every now and then to inject some moisture into his dry eyes. He slowly munched on the macaroni as he read the same sentence over and over again, unable to have it sink in its brain. Soon he got to the firmer, smokier pasta bits. Joey scraped the bottom of the pan out of... sheer hunger_,_ and a peculiar liking of the particular texture overcooked dry pasta. This was a taste acquired after years of being fed by a divorced man unschooled in the Nutrition Arts.

When Joey was sated, he made a move to get off his bed, but laziness got the better of him. He set the pot on the floor near the door, opting to bring it to the kitchen sink tomorrow before leaving for school. He lied on his back, holding the book above his head, lower and lower until it touched his face, which wasn't a bad thing because those lights were too bright anyway, and soon he was asleep.

.

The chair he was sitting in, and the rest of the room he was in - it was all non-descript but with the logic of dreams, Joey 'knew' the whole setting to be 'his father's office'.

Except that _he_ was his father.

There was a young man, almost a boy, kneeling before him. A delicate boy. His face was invisible beyond strands of light brown hair. The crisp sleeves of his olive green uniform contrasted with the ghastly pale hue of Joey's naked legs, which he couldn't move. Even lifting his arms was a chore. They were heavy. And pink and soft and hairy. Nothing like his real legs, but Joey didn't know that. He had to deal with what little info the dream gave him.

On the desk (that he knew was located behind him) laid a pen, which 'he as his father' couldn't reach. Somehow, that pen was paramount to the success of the unspecified enterprise that was underway.

Another unquestionable certainty: the boy was Seto Kaiba.

Seto Kaiba holding a checkbook, mechanically straddling Joey's thighs. Strangely enough Joey - Joey positively feltaroused but physically he was _wasn't_ - his member lay thick and limp between his legs, exposed and vulnerable.

Suddenly they were out in a barren field with no trees, and Kaiba kept rubbing his hands up and down Joey's now fat, bloated, pinkish thighs. Joey channeled his efforts to try and reach the pen behind him but his body was inert and completely _numb_; then the checkbook in Kaiba's hands wasn't a checkbook anymore but a knife, silver and with blue gem stones in it. Then Kaiba opened his mouth to scream and th-

_Fuck._

It took Joey a moment before he realized he could open his eyes, and finally reach that damned checkbook. Or not. And that a freakish version of the already not exactly reassuring kid Seto Kaiba wasn't really going to kill him.

Outside, the neighbor's kids were heading to school, shouting at one another as they walked to the bus stop.

Joey lay in bed for a good minute, allowing his heart to calm down before getting up and ready for the day. He'd been sleeping in his jeans and polo, sprawled over the comforter he'd managed to tangle between his legs in search of a little warm. The hem of his polo's sleeves had left red rims around his arms, and stray bangs had sticked to his forehead and left cheek.

The overhead light had been turned off. And the pasta pot was nowhere to be seen. Joey mentally thanked his old man, and immediately after, felt sorry for having missed both 'fun math' and 'the rest of the movie'. He'd try to make it up to his dad coming home this evening.

On his now naked legs - not fat and pinkish white, but wiry and slightly tanned, as they should be - Joey saw the jagged reddish lines printed on his skin, like fresh scars adding up to the old ones (which were few, but memorable and after a certain number of years, laughable more than anything else). Joey trotted to the bathroom in nothing but his boxer briefs, knowing very well that nothing could wake his old man at this time of the day.

Mister Morning Wood was up and ready for a 'fast one' but after the nauseating implications of that dream, Joey was most definitely _not_ aroused. It was simply one of those purely mechanical boners. And besides he wasn't in the mood for that kind of indulgence. Because... Because yesterday shouldn't have happened. It was a bad case of 'curiosity killed the cat and had him wander outside the closet. It was a bad case of Joey wanting to know what it felt like, Joey telling himself that it was okay to give in just because he'd been fantasizing about it, Joey fooling himself into thinking he'd be the with the upper hand were Kaiba the one doing the servicing.

And then there was that dream.

The rational part of his brain had secured the notion that no, Kaiba did not really want to kill him, but the dread that had pervaded the dream lingered on, robbing Joey of his usual (although these days faded) joie de vivre, and less abstractly, of his hunger. No watery cereals for this guy. He'd figure out a way to get food at lunch time. Somehow. No time for a shower either. A splash of water in the face, under the armpits, in the... area... Joey's curiosity won over and he confirmed that no, it didn't smell of saliva down there anymore. He sat on the toilet seat, elbows digging in his slightly less marred thighs, telling himself that saliva was just saliva and that all saliva smelled the same.

Joey was stuck in a pattern of fruitless repetitive thoughts until he sat up straight and realized that he was just a dude naked in his bathroom, smelling the tip of his fingers, getting late for school.


	10. Day Seven II

It would have been okay if it had been anyone _but _Tracey Simmonds, sitting next to Seto Kaiba, twirling her hair, batting her eyelashes. Under other circumstances, her painfully obvious flirting would have been just _fine_ by Joey. Amusing, even! But not today. Joey Wheeler, still reeling from the emotional chaos caused by his first homosexual experience _and _from the forces of a horrific/depressing nightmare, would _not_ sit at the back of the classroom. He would not remain helpless in the face of the torture that was Seto Kaiba's fake interest in the famously inane ramblings of Tracey Simmonds. _Hypocrite_.

"Hey Trace," Joey called out a tad too loud, bee-lining from the classroom door to the pair, too hot-headed and mentally jittery to process the fact that Kaiba _was_ showing up at school today.

Tracey turned to the source of the voice, her ponytail flying dangerously close to Kaiba's face as she did.

"Joey! You totally missed out on Saturday. You totally should've taken the night off, like!"

"Yeah, well, maybe next time," he trailed off noncommittally. His goal wasn't to make a show of his industriousness in front of the financial elites. "Look Trace," he started again, eager to settle this seating business before the bell rang, "thing is like, you're in my seat."

An unexpected wolf-whistle came from behind. Then another. _No - cut it out. This is not what you think it is. _

"Woo! Macho man," one of the guys called out. "Watching your woman!"

_What?_

Tracey blushed at the supportive roar of laughter that ensued. "Better late than never I guess," she muttered mock-cynically as she packed her things, the smile on her lips blossoming in time with the imaginary romantic scenario in her head.

Okay... So apparently the whole class was aware of something he wasn't. Well she sort of looked interested in him, but so much that it was public knowledge? Joey really was behind on school gossip.

She strategically chose the 'bookworm with the glasses' over 'the geek in the front row' for a desk companion, and kept throwing glances at Joey like it would establish some kind of telepathic link between them. Joey slid in the seat next the the Asshole Supreme, tossing his backpack atop of his desk. Everyone's attention was now turned to a happily befuddled Tracey, who was 'adamantly' denying any allegations of her and Joey being an item (not yet).

"Shall I bake you a cake," Kaiba slipped discretely to his, and his attention alone.

"Shut up."

The bell rang, quieting the cacophony of the laughter, gossip, and latest speculations as to where Joey would take Tracey out for their first date. Now this wasn't very much of a problem; but having to actually sit next to Kaiba was. Joey wished he'd taken the time to think of a better way to interrupt the one sided flirting session. Now that he thought of it, he simply could've given her a bit of attention. Ah, no use crying over spilled milk. Joey couldn't resist looking in Kaiba's direction to see if he was, well, giving _Joey_ some looks. Which he wasn't. But he looked aware - Kaiba was always aware of his surroundings.

"You were leading her on," Joey muttered so as not to be heard by the English teacher. She probably was, come to think of it, but at the moment she was doing the roll call.

Kaiba was looking straight ahead, his notebook and pens so perfectly aligned on the surface of his desk that Joey wanted to reach in and mess up his whole 'office supply feng shui' so bad Kaiba would have _no choice_ but to give him attention. Seto Kaiba and his unnaturally steady fingers-

"And you were _not_, of course," Kaiba said coolly, his voice too even.

Joey opened his mouth to speak. Okay, yeah, he _had_ been - still _was_ leading her on, technically, but that was another story. He hadn't planned everything to turn out that way. Come to think of it, maybe Kaiba hadn't, either.

"You weren't-"

"Present," Kaiba told the teacher.

Joey gritted his teeth, resenting that selfish habit Kaiba had, of keeping all the good timing to himself and refusing to share. Now Joey would be well advised to wait until his own name be called out. It was usually a bliss to be the last one on the attendance sheet, since teachers gave him some slack whenever he slipped in after the bell rang - they had a tacit arrangement with him that they wouldn't mark him down as late until his name was called out.

But today Joey cursed at the letter W for being the 23rd of the alphabet, and it seemed like everyone was doing it on purpose to be as sloppy and inefficient as possible in making their presence known to the teacher. 'S' for Simmonds somehow managed to turn the vocalizing of her name into an _event_, saying 'present' with a slight je-ne-sais-quoi that had the whole class laughing in one of those moments where everyone in the room is just connected, on the same wavelength, thinking about the exact same thing at the same time.

_Jo-ey and Tra-cey, sitting in a tree, k-i-s-s-i-n-g..._

For sakes, even the geek and the bookworm had sappy smiles on their faces.

Fuck getting angry blowjobs from Kaiba. Fuck that weird ass dream. Fuck feeling vaguely depressed and not motivated at all. Fuck wasting time coming to school.

On his way to school, Joey had sort of talked himself into chalking it off to just another instance of his brain stitching together random past life experiences. That's what it always was, and there was no use trying to find out some kind of greater meaning to it.

"...Joseph."

"Huh?"

The class roared in laughter again.

"He is here," one calm voice said coolly. Because it was Kaiba's, the quip was hilarious by default, and the teacher had to raise her voice to get the students to quiet down.

"Well, I see that everyone is awake. We're going to start off with the team readings, so you have two minutes to move in with your partner. Don't take your backpacks along, only your book and your notes. You'll be going back to your usual spots for the other half of the period for the grammar quiz."

Soon the collective whine that erupted upon hearing the word 'quiz' made way to chatter, and the clattering of chair legs against the classroom tiled floor. Kaiba and Joey stayed still amidst the commotion, staring intensely at their respective hands. Joey committed to rout out a bit of ground meat stuck between his molars, stretching his tongue uncomfortably.

"Wow. We're finally going to get some actual teamwork done. Can you believe that?" Deep inside, Joey thought it wiser not to give in his urge to sarcasm at Kaiba, but at this point he didn't care. Kaiba merely opened his copy of the book. Joey felt let down. That had been a pretty witty comment.

"Look, I haven't done the thing, I haven't read the book. Like, I can't make shit up, like."

Kaiba flipped some pages, looked for a specific post-it on the edges of his notebook and began underlining things.

"We could at least pretend we're doing something. Like, you know. Together or whatnot."

The teacher was at her desk, absorbed in sorting out some papers. The other teams had fallen in step, heads and hands at work, joking and laughing on the way. It seemed everyone else was having just a peachy time, while Joey was not only wasting his time pretending to learn, as always, but he was also having an awkward-off with the least pleasant teenage multi-millionaire on the face of the Earth.

"So um, like." Joey was stopped by Kaiba's warning glare.

_Hey, relax, man, I wasn't gonna bring 'that' up. _

Still, no use pretending they were still on 'fist fight' terms with one another. Not that they were on any other terms. They weren't on _any kinds_ of terms.

"How's everything going along?"

Either Joey's internal monologue had lasted longer than he thought or the teacher was fast on her feet. She stood by Kaiba's desk, dishing out benevolent smiles to the oil and water pair.

"Uh... We're workin' on it." He hadn't meant to bring out his ghetto accent. Now that Joey thought of it he had no idea what this 'reading task thing' was about. "It's uh, Kaiba's telling me which part he picked so that I don't picked the same." Oh man he was totally just like, making shit up on the spot.

"How far into the book are you, Joey?"

He couldn't help the glazed look in his eyes, the look that said 'oh shit I'm gonna lie but I hate it cause I hate to lie'. Joey's mom was right; her son was not a good liar.

"Uh, like chapter eleven." Did the book even have eleven chapters?

"That's good. You'll be able to finish it up in no time," she said not too loud so that the other kids, who had already finished reading their own books, and who had already handed in their papers, wouldn't hear and think he was getting special treatment. Which he was- he... Yes, he totally was, and he hated himself for it. Didn't have the heart to blame it on Kaiba this time.

The teacher had already walked away to the next group. Kaiba resumed 'not caring'.

"I don't even know what we're supposed to do," he deplored to Kaiba, then to the wall, who at least showed some empathy. "Look, no one's looking or listening, you can stop being a jerk now."

Kaiba scoffed to himself. Yeah right. Well he could do what he wanted, that didn't mean Joey had to be a jerk. Memories of yesterday - before the weird ass blow job thing - came back to Joey.

"So like, how's your little brother doing? Is he feeling better?" This would be his last attempt at small talk. If Kaiba didn't bother reacting, Joey would stop pretending to give a damn.

Kaiba put down his pen and gave Joey one long, hard look. Okay, maybe that wasn't the best topic for small talk.

"Why don't you ask _your own_ sister."

"What?"

Kaiba refused to speak. Implying that he wasn't about to amend his retort. _If you think I'll let you get away with that, Kaiba, you're wrong._ "That was uncalled for, man. That was uncalled for." Something inside him stang. Surely - surely giving someone a blow job had to count for something, even between two strangers in the bathroom of a gay club there had to be some kind of affection or tacit understanding going on between the giver and receiver.

"If you weren't so stupid nothing would've happened," Seto seethed so low Joey wasn't sure he'd heard right.

But Joey had heard, and he'd understood right, too. Kaiba was right; he really was stupid for never giving up, like a simple dog falling for the same trick over and over again.

"Alright class," the teacher's voice rang louder than the rest, "time to wrap up. Who wants to go first?"

"I do."

Joey had raised his hand, earning a few disconcerted or questioning looks. This truly went against the natural order of things. "Yeah, I think we'll start," he said confidently. More like, _aggressively_, having every intention to fuel his anger into zeal. Anything that involved not giving Kaiba the impression that Joey actually cared about what he'd said. The rest chatter in the rest of the class died down slowly enough to allow Joey to speak to Kaiba without being heard by the teacher.

"Now tell me what I'm supposed to do before I call you on that check," Joey said, sounding dry even to himself, not making eye contact with Kaiba.

"... You're supposed to pick a passage and dissect it."

Joey extended his hand. The book was lain in it. He opened a page at random and let his eyes fall on something salient. They got hooked on the single word: _Grand_.

"Could you start by reading it out loud, Joseph."

"Sure thing, Ma'am." He stood up and cambered his chest like he was about to duel. "_Grand_." He paused and looked around him. "Er... that was in italics."

The teacher raised her eyebrows, enjoining him to continue. He cleared his throat, suddenly aware that the whole class had fallen silent and was actually paying attention to him reading a passage from a book he didn't know two shits about. "If there's one word I hate, it's grand. It's so phony." Joey looked around some more, drinking in some of the attention to chase away the sudden awkward. "For a second, I was tempted to tell her to forget about the matinee. But we chewed the fat for a while. That is, she chewed it. You couldn't get a word in edgewise."

Joey had officially no idea what he was reading, who was 'she' and who the guy in the next lines was, but he remembered as he read that the teacher had said something about teenagehood. By the time he'd finished reading the whole paragraph, he felt absolutely positive that he could churn out some tasteful BS that would impress the teacher.

Unsure how to react, some students clapped a bit. Joey put the book down and started speaking right away. There was no use beating around the bush.

"So um I think this is about teenagers, because the main character's a teenager and the author wanted us to relate to that, because when you're a teenager it's hard to get heard, you're talked down a lot and not taken seriously and all, but I think in the end that's maybe because the adults who don't let young people talk is because they were young people themselves at some point and for them it's just a way to like, get back, or get even or something, but like it doesn't make sense because they're not the ones who told them to shut up in the first place. Pardon my language. So yeah, that's it."

And then he sat down, and there was a moment where everyone was still hanging at Joey's lips, not quite ready to accept that the ending to his rant was abrupt like that, and then the whole class started clapping.

Joey tried not to take the teacher's praise too seriously. He always figured if he didn't let the good stuff get to his head then the bad stuff wouldn't get to his heart. Except that he wasn't super good yet at not letting the bad stuff get to him. Hence his inability to get over anything anyone said to him - especially coming from obnoxious megalomaniac guys with dubious homoerotic tendencies.

"Could've been worse," Kaiba said before breaking eye contact.

In the background, some random kid in the classroom had raised their hand to share an opinion about what Joey had just said. A few teams around them were whisper-chatting. "Breaking news, Kaiba: you can't treat people like shit and expect everything to be okay after you've dished out some lame ass compliment."

"Don't flatter yourse-"

"Look, I don't care. Trust me, I don't."

Kaiba didn't insist.

.

Tristan was his childhood friend for a reason. He didn't fall for 'nah I'm alright, I'm just tired from my double shift'. He'd also managed to drag Joey to the burger place after school.

"You gotta _not_ tell anyone okay, cause it's just really weird," Joey warned for the tenth time.

"It's cool man, I'll keep it to the grave." Tristan said jokingly (but he meant it though). He took a small bite out of the cheeseburger that had been ordered just so that Joey would let him take the tab.

Joey still wasn't sure what part of the 'weird' he was ready to reveal. Some of it he didn't even wanna think over by himself. He saw a really short guy about their age enter the diner, a goth from another school who wore jewelry much like Yugi's. Joey sighed.

"I just had the weirdest dream this morning. Look, I told you it was weird-"

"Hey, I didn't say anything. I'm just here to listen."

Joey used the two straws in his water to play with the ice cubes, sending them clinking against the glass. He let his shoulders droop a little, then sighed. There was no other way to do this than to do this.

"So okay, it was this nightmare, right. And um, I had to _move_, but like, I _couldn't_. And um," where to go from here? _Oh yeah just for the record Kaiba gave me a blowjob the night before, right? And the checkbook thing isn't random either, like it actually _means_ something, too, but I can't tell you what because_ those were conversations Joey did not want to be having, 'not yet' or 'not ever', he wasn't quite sure yet. So he deemed it simpler to just summarize the rest of the dream. "Basically someone wanted to kill me. Yeah."

Tristan took another sip of his water.

"Yeah, like, that's pretty much it. I know that like, I know it's not real or anything but it just felt damn depressing, like I had done something wrong or whatnot. It's like I was _deserving _it or something. Like, I know it doesn't make sense right, but it still felt horrible. I woke up and I felt like total crap."

That was weird. Just talking it out for half a minute, Joey was coming up with some explanations for the dream that he hadn't been able to find from thinking it over in his head for about an hour this morning before school.

"I know, man, I get that too sometimes. Like there was this one dream with- er-" Tristan semi-panicked. "With, er, a... a girl."

Joey sighed. "Let it go man, it's been almost a year. I don't think about her everyday anymore. No big deal."

Tristan shook his head meekly. "I'm a shitty friend, man, trying to cheer you up and bringing up your sister instead. Huh, hey um, I'll buy you dessert, how about that. Saw some cheesecake in the display."

"So, my sister for some cheesecake. Yep, that seems fair."

"Oh shit- _no_! That's not what I meant, that's totally not what I meant."

"I know, man, I'm just pulling your leg."

"You're a bastard."

Joey chuckled. "I thought you were supposed to cheer me up."

"Fuck you, man," Tristan said, laughing.

"Fuck you _too_, man," Joey said, tossing a french fry at Tristan.

"Hey, I'm paying for that food!"

Joey was laughing too hard to muster a reply.

"Hey, keep it down! I have a reputation here!"

Nothing could make Joey care about this in the present moment.

"I'm-" he managed between bouts of laughter- "I'm going to tell that waitress you like redheads."

"No-"

"Oh hey! Scuse me!"

"_No,_ man, don't- _fucking_-" Tristan hissed, standing to grab Joey's raised hand and pin it to the table.

"She's coming. Your future girlfriend, she's coming."

"I _hate_ you man," Tristan hissed some more.

"You're gonna owe me for this, trust me."

.

Joey the Wingman.

He liked the sound of it.

Tristan kept whining that he could never set foot in that restaurant again. Joey insisted that he be invited to the wedding.

It was obvious, from the meek tone his voice took when he called his parents to let them know he wouldn't be home for supper, that Tristan had some kind of chore he had to go home to at that moment. He hid it well enough, though, that Joey let him lie to his face. As for himself, well, there really was no need giving his dad a call. What for? He probably wouldn't be home anyway. Nothing wrong in making a good thing last, right? Joey hadn't had that much fun in ages. Just laughing himself stupid with his best friend. Technically though, Yugi was his best friend, but he wasn't around, and frankly Joey could only let loose to that level of silly in Tristan's presence.

They were in a park now, their hips uncomfortably squeezed in swings designed to accommodate humans half their weight.

"Remember when we used to talk Yugi into riding a swing sideways-"

"And then twist it all the way up and let him spin? Yeah. Man, we were fucking idiots," Joey said, a smile in his voice.

"We were dumbasses."

"Yeah."

"But it was _funny_, too, though."

Joey allowed himself to laugh a bit. Yeah, they'd been mean to Yugi. It hadn't always necessary been violent, either. There were sometimes where they were just baiting the little guy, like, pressuring him into doing dumb things. Not that playing it down made it okay or anything.

At this moment he wished Yugi was here, just so they could sort of talk about it, iron out the unspoken wrinkles in their friendship, and say 'now's your turn, have at us, too, make _me_ spin until I'm ready to puke'. Yugi wouldn't be the kind to retaliate, though, even if only in a friendly way. He kind of was like that, patient and forgiving. As if though his mind was like, 'violence? what's that?'

"Man, I miss him."

"Yeah. Me too."

Joey kicked some sand with the tip of his shoe. "You're not doing a very good job of keeping me happy. I'm getting all nostalgic and all."

"I'm not your girlfriend."

Joey laughed at that. Tristan really had no idea. He'd probably get over it quickly if Joey told him about 'things'. But this was something he needed to sort out by himself.

"Yeah, your boobs are too small."

"Hey, shut up! They're _pecs_, okay? I'm workin' out for these, you know."

"Shut up yourself, man." Joey found that hilariously funny for some reason. Maybe it was the cheesecake. Man, that shit was _sweet_.

"_You_ shut up."

"No, _you_ shaddup," Joey slurred, unable to stop laughing. Maybe it was the ice cream they'd had _after_ the cheesecake.

Tristan got up and rotated Joey's swing 180 degrees, making the chain links cross right above Joey's head.

"Yo if you do that, I'm gonna puke all over your fancy shmancy shoes."

Tristan made a face. "I paid for that food so I'mma do what I want with it." He flipped Joey another 180. And then another; at that point it was easier, it spun like in butter for a while. Joey was holding his head back, laughing like a madman, powerless in the face of his fate. The metallic structure creaked a little, but gave no sign that it would give under Joey's weight.

"It's not fucking fair," Joey told his abs cramping from the laughter. The chain links were starting to twirl and shrink upwards. Joey's eyes were now level with Tristan's.

"Okay, any last words?"

"You're-" Joey held onto the metal braid with one arm, wiping off a laughter tear with the other. "It's not fair cause I don't get my revenge after that 'cause you're too fat it'll break the swings-"

"You are _so_ dead, man." Rather than let him go and gain gradual speed Tristan gave Joey's body extra momentum by swinging him full force (no, man, don't do that, man) before leaping backwards to enjoy the show.

.

So Joey's digestive tract was still working on that ice cream after all.

Tristan sort of _really_ needed to be back home before a certain time to do that thing that 'really wasn't a problem'. Joey ended up walking him home just to stretch the evening a little.

But man, did Tristan live in the middle of nowhere. Well not quite. More like they each lived on opposite sides of town. But Joey didn't mind. He'd done so much long distance walking over the last week that he could take any amount of intra-city mileage now; he was even jogging through some portions of it, whenever there wasn't a traffic light to hold him back.

Circulation was slow on the large artery that traversed his neighbourhood, even for a Monday evening. It was this eerie time of the day where it was light enough to see, but dark enough so that cars had to turn their headlights on. The sky and the air around him was drenched in a thick, blue-grey light, the one gas station signs throwing disorganized bright reds and whites into the mix. There wasn't one concrete slab that wasn't fissured one way or another, and Joey eventually gave up on not stepping on the sidewalk cracks. He stopped when he reached the main side street that would lead him to his apartment park.

A darker, wet stripe of asphalt went alongside the sidewalk where the street cleaner had passed. Joey let his eyes trail to them until they were too narrow to make out in the waning light. At the end of the boulevard was an elevated highway, its endless supply of cars running fast across one another. They wouldn't stop for him. And more would keep coming. And coming and coming and coming.

Joey looked away.

He had a life to go back to.

.

There was a faint odor of excrement lurking in the hallway. The next door neighbour had a new puppy; she had probably hadn't come back home since this morning and hadn't been there to clean up. If only she could place the training pad in the bathroom or something and not next to her front door. It wasn't normally something Joey'd let himself be annoyed with, but _normally_ the smell didn't reach as far as inside his own apartment. Joey hastily closed the door behind him to cut off the smell.

Lights were out. His father wasn't back home yet. Joey went straight for the kitchen sink, splashed some water on his face to wash the sticky mix of sweat and outdoor dust off his skin. He pinch-rubbed his nose to get rid of the poop smell and took off his t-shirt. Because he was thirsty from his jog-walk he poured himself a glass of water, not waiting for the tap to cool down. Lukewarm would do.

The hamburger helper pot lay exactly where it was this morning, next to the crusty wooden spoon, at the bottom of the sink. Joey threw in the remaining half of his third glass of water so that the bits of pasta would soak. His father should've done that last night; now it'd take forever until anyone could scrub it and use it again. Maybe he hadn't wanted to wake Joey up; the pipes could get really loud at a certain pressure, and the walls were so thin that any sound resonated through the apartment. Television was another thing altogether; it became a soothing, steady stream of indistinguishable sounds from behind Joey's bedroom door, and he'd grown accustomed to falling asleep to it. The kind of lullaby he could afford.

It then occurred to him that the smell was actually just as strong _inside _the apartment. Joey's first reflex was to check the soles of his shoes for any kind of dog poop he might've stepped on outside. They were pretty clean. He took them off and tossed them toward the mat near the door, hoping that they land close enough to his father's own pair. Then he went for the bathroom.

It didn't look like there had been any kind of overflow or anything in the bath or toilet. Didn't smell that much in here, either. Maybe it was his nose playing tricks and that it was a food smell - come to think of it it wasn't exactly an excrement smell. There was nothing in the pantry of fridge that had gone bad or anything. So Joey looked everywhere, just so that he could clean the damn whatever-happened before he could set off to try and do some homework in front of the TV. The laundry basket was another sensible possibility. Soon anything that had a door, any compartment, became a possibility. And then - why not- his father's bedroom. The man hated for Joey to be peeking in there, but he had a valid excuse.

From the meager light - the blinds were closed, which should have alerted him - Joey found that the heap of fabric on the bed looked like his father's sleeping form. The room really smelled like feces. And urine. And a faint something else; not something powerful enough to make him gag, but something _strange_, something he'd never encountered before.

It didn't smell good; it didn't smell _right_.

A rush of something flashed through Joey's brain - something was off. "Dad?" He called out, feeling stupid for allowing himself to panic a little. It made as little sense as being afraid of the dark. Joey stepped closer. His father was lying on his back, his mouth open unnaturally wide. Joey kneeled by his side, taking a limp, cool hand in his, taking slow, shallow breaths to fight the powerful stench.

"Dad," he called, his voice louder and commanding. "Dad," he repeated to the void. The whole room felt completely still, every object purposeful and interconnected; a morbid still life, a slab of time that had congealed forever ago.

.

**_Author's Note_:**

Expect chapter eleven to be updated in September. Also, this story is cross-posted on AFF and Ao3. Thank you for reading!


End file.
